


Perseverance: Good Food, Bad Laughs, and Time-Space Tomfuckery

by TheOldGristMill



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alcohol, Angst, Autistic OC, Bad movies, Cryptography, Depression, Fantastic Racism, Gen, Humor, Original Character(s), Post-Pacifist Route, Smoke bombs!, So many Undertale Characters, Suicidal Thoughts, Violence, Worldbuilding, baby's first fic, foul-mouthed goblins, lol what editor, lots and lots and lots of alcohol, references to pretty much everything, speculative biology
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2017-05-07
Packaged: 2018-08-13 14:03:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 32,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7979350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOldGristMill/pseuds/TheOldGristMill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stop it. I’m a self-medicated wreck of a human being. I’m not good with people. Why are you talking to me about theoretical physics, why am I suddenly playing sidekick to a seven-foot armored badass, and why are we gearing up to stop a demon? And who’s that tall, creepy guy I keep dreaming about?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Okay, so, a Skeleton Walks into a Bar...

A proper story's supposed to start the beginning.

It's hard as _fuck_ with this one.

I mean, I guess I could start with two jackasses with poor impulse control blundering into places they _absolutely_ shouldn't be, but then you'd be like, "who the hell put these two idiots together and then let them run around without supervision? What are they doing? Oh God, now they're screaming, they're screaming, make them stop."

I could start with an old man trying to harness forces he has absolutely no idea how to control, but... honestly, I don't really know a lot about that, and what I do kind of makes my head hurt.

It could start with the Barrier being broken, and all that good shit, but that isn't where the story really _starts,_ does it?

I guess it all starts with some poor kid who has _no possible way_ of knowing just what he's getting into. But, you know, I'm pretty sure you've heard that story already. It's more of a backstory kind of thing, anyway, no matter how important it is.

Sans? What about Sans?

Sure, Sans. I guess Sans is an integral part of this. Sans. I’ll start with Sans. Let me know if you get bored, okay?

Okay.

Here we go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've procrastinated on this for WAAAAAYYY too long. It's 3 AM and I can't words good. I'd like to apologize to everyone reading this. I am so, so sorry for what you're about to read.
> 
> Please, PLEASE give me some constructive criticism.


	2. Local Goblin-Man is as Bad at Monster Interaction as Human Interaction

I needed a job.

More accurately, I needed money, in order to be able to afford the basic necessities of life. You know, like cigarettes.

Day 3 of my hunt saw me waking up, making myself semi-presentable, and checking everywhere in the neighborhood before catching a bus to the other side of town and trying again. In retrospect, I probably should have checked the internet for more job listings first. I also should have done this on a day with less pollen. I definitely should have realized that if I wasn’t able to fit all my resumes in my pocket, the solution didn’t involve wearing a jacket in the middle of August just for the extra pockets.

I am not good at planning.

I was hot. I was tired. I wasn’t optimistic about my chances of receiving any calls back. The combination of heat and stifling humidity combined to give me the impression that I was walking through the moist, steamy rectum of Satan himself.

I needed a cigarette.

I stopped outside a bar, put a cigarette in my mouth, and flicked my lighter. It went out immediately. I flicked it again. It went out again. I flicked it a third time, and it failed to light entirely. I turned to face the wall, blocking out the wind, and flicked it again. It didn’t light. I flicked it again, and it went out as soon as I touched it to my cigarette. I called it a fucker, stuck it directly under my cigarette, and watched as it did _fucking nothing_.

“Mother fuck, goddamn piece of shit, hell-cock shitting fuck-mother!”

“ _Ass,”_ I added. “ _Balls._ ”

“Need a light?” Someone behind me asked. I turned and found myself looking at a bipedal dog holding a lighter.

Oh, right. Monsters were a thing now.

...Alright, then.

I reached out and took the lighter.

“Thanks.”

“No problem. I’m Doggo.”

I nodded. “Will.”

I lit the cigarette and handed the lighter back. He used it to light what I’m pretty sure was a dog treat and leaned back against the wall. I did the same. He smoked in silence. I smoked in silence. Sometimes we made eye contact. I cleared my throat and he turned to look at me, then looked away again. It was awkward.

I decided to make it more awkward.

“Uh… Mmmm. Huh.” Doggo turned to look at me.

_He’s looking at you he’s fucking looking at you fucking SAY SOMETHING, idiot._

“…Soooooo,” I began. “…How, is, uh… surface… life?”

Doggo took the dog treat out of his mouth and blew out a cloud of beef-scented smoke. “Pretty good, pretty good. Grillby’s re-opened, so it’s nice to catch up with the other members of the Canine Unit.”

“There’s a nice park a couple blocks from here,” he added.

I smiled and nodded.

“ _Nice_. Welp, I better get going.” I turned to leave. “I’ll see you around-"

I was eye to socket with a skeleton. Like, an actual human skeleton. With the same teeth and hand-bones and everything.

“hey, doggo. who’s this?“

“ _Fuck!_ ” I shrieked.

“hey, fuck.” The skeleton winked at me. How the _fuck_ do you wink without any eyelids?

“i’m sans,” he said, extending a hand. “sans the skeleton. nice to meet ya.”

“ _No,_ ” Doggo hissed. I shook his hand anyway. A wet, farty sound filled the air. I stared at the small, pink object in Sans’s hand.

“…Is that a whoopee cushion?”

“yup.” Sans winked again.

“…Nice. So, uh, how long have you been there?” I asked.

“just got here. i was out jogging with my brother and decided to stop by for something to eat.”

I looked at his feet. “Wait, you were jogging?”

“yeah.”

“…In slippers?”

“yeah. what do you jog in?”

_Little guy’s weird. I like that._

I grinned at Sans. At least, I hoped it was a grin. I’m not going to lie: I’ve practiced smiling in the mirror, because my natural smile makes small children cry and makes me look like I’m about to take a bite out of either a seal or a grizzled sea captain. The secret’s to smile with your eyes. I think. Practice hasn’t improved it much. Hopefully I don't look like I'm about to turn someone into a suit anymore. Or like I'm in horrific, horrific pain.

“My imagination.”

"gah!"

Sans's body slowly relaxed. “wow, uh... heh. nice. i'll run that one by my brother the next time he tries to drag me out here.”

Someone was running down the street behind me.

“that’s him now.”

_Whap whap whap whap whap whap WHAP…_

“SANS!!!”

_Skeletor!_

“papyrus.”

"Will."

“WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?” The second skeleton roared as he ran up to us.

“jogging, bro, just like you.”

“WELL, I KNOW _THAT_. WHERE DID YOU GO? HOW DID YOU GET HERE FIRST?”

“i passed you.”

“ARE SUGGESTING THAT YOU OUTRAN ME?” Skeletor sputtered. “IN YOUR SLIPPERS???”

I didn’t think that boots, a scarf, and a t-shirt that someone had written _JOG BOY_ on in permanent marker constituted proper jogging apparel any more than slippers, but I wasn’t about to bring it up.

Sans shrugged. “i found a shortcut.”

“A ‘SHORTCUT?’”

“yeah. y’know, a direct path between-“

“I KNOW WHAT A SHORTCUT IS, SANS!”

I got the feeling that arguments like this were a regular thing. My conversation with Sans appeared to be over, or at least delayed long enough to make my exit. I slipped away and made my way into the bar.

I’m not sure what I expected to find inside. Some kind of Hieronymus Bosch painting with booze. Weird furniture designed for wings, or tails, or something. The bar looked like any other bar, aside from the clientele. There was some dude who looked like Audrey II sitting in a booth, a dog the size of a Volkswagen playing a card game with another dog, some sort of duck-fish hybrid, and… Some kind of giant, sentient onion complaining about the wi-fi? I assumed he was an onion. Like, a really lumpy onion, crossed with one of the Martians from War of The Worlds. He definitely _smelled_ like an onion as I worked my way past him and sat down at the bar.

The bartender put down the glass he was cleaning and walked over to me.

“Welcome to Grillby’s,” he hissed. “Can I get you anything?”

“Yeah, thanks, can I please get, uh, gin? Neat gin. Thanks.”

“...Anything else?”

“Nah, I’m good, thanks.”

“...Alright, neat gin, coming right up.”

“Thanks.”

I looked at my phone as Sans walked through the door behind me.

“hey, everyone.”

“Hey, Sans.”

“Greetings, Sans.”

“Hiya, Sansy~”

_Don’t sit by me don’t sit by me don’t sit by me don’t sit by me PLEASE…_

Sans sat down on the stool next to me. Papyrus sat down next to him, legs bent like a giant, skeletal cricket. He looked distinctly uncomfortable. I hunched further over my phone, almost touching it with my nose, trying to make it clear that whatever I was looking at was _really_ interesting. I should have brought earbuds.

_Shit. Please don’t talk to me._

“HELLO, HUMAN!”

_Fuuuuuck._

“…Hi, uh…”

I cleared my throat.

“Sorry, what was your name again? I’m Will."

“AND I AM THE GREAT PAPYRUS!”

I looked around the bar, scrambling for a conversation topic. The bartender brought me my drink. The bar. The bar! Yes!

“Sooooo… Nice place. Love the atmosphere. I’ve always liked those kind of divey places.“

I realized the bartender was listening to me.

“Shit. That came out _really_ wrong. I’m not saying this place is bad, or anything! I mean, the atmosphere’s uh...”

“It’s got personality” finished the hamster at the end of the bar. Was he a hamster? He kind of looked like a hamster. Or a gerbil, or something. Some kind of rodent with sunglasses and a leather jacket.

...Wait, maybe he was a horse.

“Right. Everyone knows your name, you’ve got the regulars coming in here since the place opened. It’s not soulless like your local Applebee’s or T.G.I. Friday’s or something like that. You know what I mean? It’s got charm.”

“Local culture.” Leatherhamster added.

“Sans, any input?”

Sans was staring at me. Not awkward-staring. Creepy-staring, like he was looking into my soul. Or he was spacing out. He’s kind of hard to read.

“Sans? Sans. _Saaaaaaaaans_. Pajama Sans. One Punch Sans. Grunkle Sans. The Final Sans. Sans? Hey, Sans!"

“…huh.”

“What?”

“…nothing, just thinking. so, what brings grillby’s second human customer in?

“Well, I’ve been looking for…. Wait, second? You’ve only had two humans in here?”

“well, yeah,” Sans said, closing his eyes. “the bar just opened, and we, uh…”

“we don’t get many humans in here.”

His leaned in close and opened his eyes again. His pupils had disappeared, leaving gaping black pits.

“ _So why did you come here?_ ”

“Oh, uh, uh, well, uh, you-see-I-was-looking-for-a-job-and-I’ve-been-out-all-day-and-stopped-outside-for-a-smoke-and-Doggo-loaned-me-his-lighter-then-you-came-by-and-now-I’m-here!”

Sans’s pupils returned as he put his hands up.

“…hey, hey, take it easy. i’m just joking with you.”

“Oh. _Ohhhhhh._ Heh.”

I was suddenly very interested in my drink.

_Jesus Christ._

“SANS! YOU’RE MAKING THE HUMAN UNCOMFORTABLE WITH YOUR JOKERY!”

“Nah, dude, it’s cool. I just don’t… laugh much, is all.”

“hey, it’s all good. i know someone just like that. so you’ve been looking for a job, and you stopped here to eat?”

“Uh… yeah. Yeah, I guess. Why?”

“just curious, is all. we’ve had some trouble with the locals, and this place is full of monsters, so…”

I furrowed my brow. “What does… _Jesus!_ No! _No!_ I’m not here to cause trouble or anything like that! I don’t give a shit about monsters! Wait, _shit_ , sorry, that... fuck, that came out _really_ wrong. I mean-"

“no, it’s okay, i get what you mean. but also, yeah, that came out really wrong.”

“You know, not, uh, not going out of my way to harass anyone, or anything,” I stammered.

“i know, i got it.”

“…So, uh, what’s happened?”

“there’s been some interesting stuff spray-painted on the walls," Sans answered. "no violence.”

“yet,” he added.

“Oh, that’s… That’s good.”

“so you’ve been out looking for a job all day? i might be able to talk to a couple people.”

“Yeah. That’d actually be pretty awesome, thanks. Well, okay, not all day. I actually slept in, because, like, it’s not like I had anywhere to be, and, like… Have you ever had a dream where it seems interesting enough that you go back to sleep to see if you can finish it?”

“no.”

“NO.”

“Oh, uh… Well, uh, good. Because it doesn’t seem anywhere near as interesting now that I’m awake. And I can’t remember most of it.”

“WHAT WAS IT ABOUT?”

“Ah, like I said, it was boring. So, like... . I was sitting in an empty room, talking about wormholes or time travel or some quantum physics shit with... someone. An old guy, I think. Then, right as he was getting to something that felt really important, I... _ammm_ boring you. Shit. Never mind."

“Normally my dreams are _super_ weird. Like the one where my old cat came back to life with my grandpa’s face, or the one where I was Josh from _Drake and Josh_ and I realized that Drake was a necromancer, so he sent the government to kill me, and I started leaping like twenty feet in the air to, uh…”

Sans was staring at me again.

“Oh, right. _Drake and Josh_ was a sitcom on Nickelodeon,” I explained, “about… wait, is it still running? One sec, lemme get my phone out and- “

Sans cut me off. “do you remember anything about the dream?”

“Yeah. Drake left these scratches on the wall that started bubbling like there was acid in them or something, and I was somehow able to pick up from that-“

“no, the other dream.”

“Oh. _Oh.”_

“did the room have any walls?”

“Uh, what? Yeah. Most rooms have walls, otherwise they’re, like… a balcony, or a deck, or something. Black ones, I think. And a grey floor. Actually, wait, it might have just been a grey floor floating in-“

Sans grabbed me. “what did the old guy look like?!”

“I… can’t remember. Like I said, it’s a super vague dream.”

Sans sighed as I stood up.

“I should probably go. I’ve gotta get home and make something to eat. You know, save money, use what’s in my fri-“

Sans sat me back down. “you should get something. i’ll have grillbz put it on my tab. c’mon, i was enjoying the conversation.”

I frowned. “ _Really?_ ”

Conversations with me aren’t usually enjoyable.

“well, yeah. i like, uh, learning about the surface. and stuff. so, anyway, can you remember _anything_ the guy in your dream said to you?”

I shook my head. “No. Nothing. Just the subject, vaguely.”

Sans frowned, or at least looked like he might be frowning. He didn’t move his mouth much. Or at all. I wondered how he ate.

“…huh. see anything on the menu you like?”

I looked at the menu. The fries looked the cheapest.

“…the fries sound pretty good.”

“yeah. i’ll probably get ‘em, too. yo, grillbz! can we get a double order of fries?”

“AND A GLASS OF MILK, PLEASE.”

“Oh, and a shot of vodka, please. No, wait, double shot. Thanks.”

“so, you said you were talking about physics or something? Time travel?" Sans asked, inching forwards in his seat. "is that something you’re into?”

I shrugged. "Eh, no. I used to read a lot of sci-fi, though."

“OH, SANS LOVES SCIENCE FICTION! ESPECIALLY WHEN IT’S REAL.”

“So you’re a scientist or something? I was actually majoring in Biology before I took a year off.”

Sans tensed up. “...nah, i’m just interested in it, is all.”

“ _Oh._ Oh. So, what do you guys, uh, do? For a living?”

_Shit. Why the fuck did you ask that? You don’t know if they're having trouble finding work, or just got fired, or…_

“i run a hot dog stand.”

Papyrus puffed out his chest. “AND I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WORLD-FAMOUS SPAGHETTORE AND MASCOT TO THE MONSTER AMBASSADOR, AM A SOON-TO-BE WORLD-RENOWNED ARTIST AND EXHIBITIONIST!”

“ _exhibition._ he’s in an exhibition down at the art museum.”

“Ebott Institute of Arts, right? Nice.”

“yeah, that one.”

“I’ve been there a couple times. It’s alright. Great way to meet art snobs and hordes of screaming kids on a field trip at the same time.”

“hey, what’s wrong with kids?” Sans asked.

“Nothing. I like kids. The problem is that when you get a bunch of them together and take away the supervision, they get excited. And excited kids _scream_. And do shit they’re not supposed to.”

I put my glass down.

“Ever been in the middle of a crowd of screaming six year-olds? The noise drowns out your thoughts. It drowns out your _dreams._ ”

“so, uh, you’ve worked with kids?”

“Yeah. At the zoo. I went from teaching kids about the animals to stomping around yelling at them in, like, three days.”

“'Don’t tap on the glass, please. Don’t throw things at the animals, please. Don’t feed the animals, please. Don’t climb on the fence, please. Don’t throw garbage into the enclosures, please. Don’t tap on the glass, please. Don’t tap on the glass, please. _Don’t throw things at the animals, please._ FUCKING LOOK AFTER YOUR HELLSPAWN, PLEASE, BECAUSE THEY EITHER CAN’T READ THE SIGNS WE HAVE POSTED EVERY FIVE GODDAMN FEET IN MULTIPLE FUCKING LANGUAGES OR THEY DON’T FUCKING CARE, AND WE’RE NOT BEING PAID TO LOOK AFTER YOUR KIDS WHILE YOU FUCK OFF AND DO YOUR OWN THING, _ASSHOLE_.'”

Leatherhamster, the bartender, all of the dogs, and probably everyone in the bar turned to look at me. I sighed.

“…The petting zoo was the worst. Man, the shit people did there would straight-up kill your soul. We’re the real animals.”

“IS THAT WHY YOU QUIT?” Papyrus asked.

I cleared my throat. “…So, Papyrus, what do you do? Painting? Sculpture?”

“PUZZLES!”

“apparently they’re classifying puzzles as some kind of monster folk art,” Sans explained.

“Huh. So, like, mazes, or those puzzles where if you flip one tile all the others around it flip too, or, uh… riddles… wait, are riddles puzzles?”

Papyrus thought about this for a second, snapped, then pointed at me. “THEY’RE LATERAL THINKING PUZZLES.”

“Dude, I used to love lateral thinking puzzles. I don’t do them anymore. Why don’t I do them anymore? I know there’s like, fifteen good ones that people keep repeating, but I could probably find something new if I actually looked. Why don’t I do them anymore?”

“I BET I COULD GIVE YOU ONE.”

“…I guess," I said with a shrug. "Give me something good."

“OKAY. A GOOD ONE,” Papyrus said, tapping his fingers on the bar.

“UH… GIVE ME A SECOND…”

Sans cut in. “i’ve got one.”

Papyrus glared at his brother. “IS IT A PUN, SANS?”

Sans’s eyes crinkled. “…maybe.”

“what’s a pirate’s favorite letter?” He asked.

Papyrus pinched the bridge of his nose (or was that just his nose?) and sighed loudly.

“IS IT ‘ARR’ PERHAPS?”

“arrrrrrrr! yeah. you liked it, didn’t you?”

“NO!”

“you’re smiling.”

“IT’S A PITY SMILE!!!”

“…Yar, ye be thinkin’ that,” I growled, “but his first love be the C.”

Papyrus’s jaw dropped.

“OH MY GOD, SANS! YOU SEE WHAT KIND OF INFLUENCE YOU ARE ON MY NEW FRIEND?”

 “what?” Sans asked with a wink. “am i not allowed to be a _port_ of this conversation?”

 “SAAAAANS!”

“Yes, but I think you _mast_ ask your brother first!”

“heh. nice. _arrrrr_ there any more?”

“YOU ALREADY DID THAT ONE!”

“Well, of _corsair_ are, but I’ll have to _sink_ of them!”

Papyrus’s eyes bulged out of his skull.

“BOTH OF YOU ARE HORRIBLE!”

“aw, c’mon, paps, _water_ you so upset about?”

“STOP.”

“Maybe he wants us to _Teach_ him some.”

Sans stared at me blankly. Wait, he'd literally spent most of his life under a rock, hadn't he? Shit.

“Y’know… like… Teach? Edward Teach? Blackbeard?”

“...oh. uh, i _sea_ what you did there.”

“HEY LOOK OUR FOOD’S HERE LET’S EAT FOOD SOUNDS GREAT DON’T YOU THINK? LET’S EAT!”

“alright, here comes the grub!” Sans exclaimed.

He pulled a half-empty bottle of ketchup out of his hoodie and offered it to me.

“want some ketchup?”

I looked at the bottle. “…Is the cap loose?”

“…maybe?”

“I’ll pass, thanks.”

I watched as Sans pushed his fries aside and started pouring ketchup directly into his mouth, spilling a little on his shirt in the process. It was a little weird (I mean, who drinks just straight-up ketchup? You've got to make it into barbecue sauce or pink sauce first) but I honestly wasn’t really in a position to judge.

However, the fact that Onion Man had walked up behind us, breathing heavily, was _very_ weird.

“…Hey,” I said.

"Your jokes suck."

"...Okay?"

"why are you here, jerry?"

"My phone's dead," he said, extending a grease-covered hand. "I need yours. It's urgent."

"i don't have a phone."

"I just _saw_ you-"

"nope."

"...Last time I ever ask _you_ for help," he muttered, turning to me and extending a grease-slicked hand. "Hey."

"I don't have a phone, either."

"...I just watched you put it in your pocket."

"It's a friend's."

"...Can I borrow i-?"

"It's also dead."

Onion Man sighed and oozed back over to a booth. I watched the woman there put her earbuds back in as he started talking at her. He didn’t seem to notice.

“…Who the _fuck_ was that?”

“JERRY…” Papyrus sighed.

“i don’t know what his deal is," Sans said. "he's the _worst_ , but he’s harmless.”

“Huh. Reminds me of this guy I used to see at the University of Ebott campus. The first time I saw him, I thought he was a professor. Turns out he used to be a business major, dropped out, and… never really left.”

“huh. what’d you say your major was again?”

“Biology and Environmental Science. I’m, uh, taking a year off, because the University of Ebott sucks and doesn’t care about its students, and their entire administration is two-engine trainwreck between a travelling shitshow and a professional clusterfucking team, so I’m looking around for a better school while I try to work some shit out."

I waved my hand in the air and turned to Grillby. “Can I, uh, please get a refill? Sorry, Sans; I’ll pay for the drinks.”

“thanks for the offer, but its fine. i’ll get them.”

“No, really, let me get the drinks, please. You’re already paying for the food, and most of them are mine, anyway. Actually, almost all of them are mine so far.”

“…Let me pay for Papyrus’s milk,” I added.

“I WILL PAY FOR MY MILK.” Papyrus stood up.

“IN FACT, AS A SHOW OF MY GENEROSITY, I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WOULD LIKE TO ‘BUY A ROUND’ FOR EVERYONE AT THIS BAR!” A cheer went up from one of the booths.

“oh my god, papyrus, no!” Sans turned to address the bar.

“he’s kidding! kidding. he’s just kidding! papyrus, sit back down.”

“NO ONE OUT-GENEROUSIFIES THE GREAT PAPYRUS!”

“you’ve been out-generousified. please sit back down.” Sans pulled his brother back into his seat.

“You used to be cool, Sansy!” came a cry from one of the booths. Someone threw a balled-up napkin at him.

“…it’s just two out of three, right? let me get it. grillby owes me a favor anyway.”

“Well, then Grillby has to pay for my drinks. And it’s three, not two.”

“look, it’s fine. i’m already paying for your food, might as well get the drinks, too.”

"I'd prefer that you didn't."

“hey, can I ask you something?”

I furrowed my brow. “…I guess?”

“do you ever look up anything about... strange disappearances?”

“Oh, yeah. I'm pretty much obsessed with the bizarre. Unsolved murders, weird broadcasts, I love that shit."

"I'm literally wearing underpants with sasquatch on them right now," I said.

"uh... okay?"

"They're the most comfortable pair I own. I call them my lucky 'squatches."

"...uh... i was talking more like... crime stuff than... that."

_Stop it. Stop talking about your underwear. Why are you doing this? Stop talking and run. No, wait, change the subject. Change the subject. NOW._

"Oh, weird crimes! Fuck yeah. Ever heard of Hinterkaifeck?”

"nope."

"NO."

"One of the weirdest fucking crimes I've ever seen. Basically, this farmer went to his neighbors and said ‘I found those footprints outside that go inside but not out the other day, and today I found a newspaper that nobody’s read on the kitchen table. Weird, huh? Maybe that maid who said the house was haunted six months ago was right.’”

“i’m talking about disappearances, specifically.”

“Oh, yeah, a couple, but usually the murders are more interesting. So, anyway, a couple days later the Grubers, the family that lived on the farm, disappeared, but nobody thought anything of it because smoke was still coming out their chimney and the animals were being fed. Eventually, after they’ve been missing like three days, they go in to see why nobody’s been into town, and it turns out that someone lured them all into the barn, killed them, and had been living in the house for three days.”

_Shit. Was that creepy? That was probably creepy._

“wow, that’s, uh… that’s interesting. are you looking into any disappearances? like, recent ones? ‘cause i’d kind of like to hear about those.”

I shook my head. “…Nah. Not off the top of my head, no.”

“oh.”

All in all, it wasn't the worst first impression I'd ever made. Not that it couldn't be if I kept talking.

_Idiot. Should've gone with Max headroom or the Talma Shud case. You fuckup. Fuckup, fuckup, fuckup._

I pretended to check my watch, realized I wasn’t wearing a watch, checked my phone, then finished my drink.

“ _Annnnyway_ , I should probably get going. You know, it’s getting late, and I’ve been walking around all day, so I will probably… see you guys later. I live a couple blocks over on Alma Avenue, so I’ll probably be back in here some time. We should meet up.”

“WE CAN GO TO MY EXHIBITION!”

“Hell yeah, that sounds awesome! We should do that.”

I checked my phone again.

“Alright, Later.”

“see ya.”

I turned and worked my way past Onion Man again and two more dogs, out into the street. I smacked my lighter and managed to get it to work long enough to light a cigarette.

It was starting to rain.

I glared at the storm cloud directly above me. “Well, fuck you too, _Sky_.”

The sky’s response came in the form of a torrential downpour, soaking my clothes and dousing my cigarette. I swore and trudged back to my apartment.

_Okay, so, if someone just hated the Grubers, they wouldn’t have fucked around for six months, and if it was a serial killer there’d be more deaths. And they wouldn't take care of the animals after everyone else was dead. That's extra work.  
_

_Fuuuuuuuuuuuck._

_We know that the murderer had a mattock, specifically one with a pick on it, and knew how to use it. They knew how to use farming equipment, they knew how to take care of the animals, and the Grubers were rich enough to hire a maid which means they could probably afford a farmhand and then fire the disgruntled farmhand who would have TAKEN THE MONEY. FUCK._

_…Did I pass my apartment? I passed my apartment. Fuck._

I turned and walked back to my apartment. The carpeting in the hallways had that weird smell that I've always associated with carpets made before people knew what a “carcinogen” was, and everyone could hear everyone, but it didn’t have bedbugs or anything like that, and the size of the room didn’t bother me, so it wasn’t that bad. The radiators had a tendency to spit out water when they were turned on, sure, and the dripping water formed moldy patches on the ceiling below them, but it was warm. Sometimes.

Okay, no, it was a shithole. But for now, it was my shithole, and that was all that mattered.

I hauled myself up the stairs, stripped my clothes off, and flopped into bed.

I slept. I was fucking _exhausted_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WHY DID IT TAKE ME A MONTH TO FINISH THIS? I'm making a resolution: One week, one chapter.  
> Please, leave constructive criticism.


	3. [HKCGXK ZNK SGT CNU YVKGQY OT YGTY]

YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE DONE THAT.

YOU REALLY SHOULDN’T HAVE DONE THAT.

THAT MESSAGE WASN’T MEANT FOR YOU. YOU SHOULDN’T HAVE BEEN ABLE TO RECEIVE IT.

BUT YOU CAN, AND YOU DID.

HOW DID YOU DO THAT?

YOU’VE CAUGHT HIS ATTENTION. YOU’RE A PART OF THE CYCLE, NOW. YOU MUST LISTEN TO ME VERY, VERY CAREFULLY:

EVEN IF YOU THINK YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON IT, ABSOLUTELY, UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHOULD YOU...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My laptop just died. It had all my notes on it!
> 
> Here, have a thing.


	4. THE GREAT PAPYRUS NEVER TAKES THINGS SLOW!

Someone was pounding on the door. I wrapped my pillow around my head and hoped they would stop. They did not.

_Who the hell is that? Landlord? Neighbor?_

_…Cops?_

“HUMAN? ARE YOU IN THERE?”

“Whozzat?” I groaned.

“IT IS I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS!”

I rolled out of bed, hitting the floor with a loud _THUMP_.

“…Papyrus? What’s going on?” I asked as I stood up, put my pants on and padded over to the door.

“WE’RE GOING TO THE ART MUSEUM, OF COURSE!”

I opened and closed my mouth while my brain slowly started up for the day. “The Art… Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. That’s _today?_ Literally a day after you met me?”

“YES.”

“And we’re actually _going_? Jesus, you were serious about that?”

“WELL, YES. WHY WOULDN’T I BE?”

“Because… How did you even find where I live?”

“I CHECKED EVERY APARTMENT ON ALMA AVENUE SYSTEMATICALLY!”

“Checked…” I mumbled, “every…”

“…YOUR NEIGHBORS AREN’T VERY NICE.” he added.

“IT’S FIVE THIRTY, ASSHOLE!” someone shouted from down the hall.

Five thirty. Who the _fuck_ wakes up before six on a Saturday? Or at six. Actually, who the fuck wakes up on a Saturday? Papyrus, apparently. I scratched my chin, trying to figure out how to keep him from waking the entire building up, and, more importantly, trying to figure out how to keep from getting blamed for it.

“Do you want to co-…” I glanced at the dirty – or was that clean? - laundry strewn about the floor and the dishes in the room. “…Let me get decent and I’ll be right out.”

I stumbled into the bathroom and brushed my teeth, glancing at the inspirational Post-it notes I'd stuck to the mirror. None of them were helpful. I made a mental note to improve them as I unstuck my feet from the linoleum, stumbled over to the laundry pile, and examined my shirt options. Which was more suitable attire for an art gallery: the one with a UFO and the words _I WANT TO LEAVE_ , or _MOUNT EBOTT NATURE CENTER – HUG A BAT TODAY_? After a moment of consideration, I decided that _I WANT TO LEAVE_ better suited my mood and slipped on a pair of cleanish smelling socks. Two socks. Not an actual, matching pair. I threw my shoes on and cracked the door open just enough to squeeze out.

“HUMAN! YOU LOOK SPECTACULAR,” Papyrus exclaimed. “NICE APARTMENT! IT’S VERY… UH… COZY!”

“…Thanks," I muttered as I quickly stepped out and closed the door. "My options were sharing a kitchen, finding a roommate, or this.”

“LET ME SHOW YOU TO MY CAR!”

“STOP FUCKING YELLING!” the mystery shouter shouted.

“…let’s just get to the car” I whispered.

“THAT SOUNDS LIKE A GOOD IDEA,” Papyrus replied in a loud stage-whisper as he stomped down the stairs.

“…Wait, when does the museum open?” I asked, creaking along behind him.

“TEN O’ CLOCK!”

“Ten… _We’re four hours early?”_ I sputtered.

“I LIKE TO BE EARLY! BEING READY EARLY SHOWS HOW MUCH YOU CARE!!”

“Sleep is also something to care about,” I said dryly.

“I'M USUALLY TOO BUSY TO SLEEP.”

“Wow. _Wow._ That’s, uh… Probably not healthy?”

“NONSENSE! I’M THE PICTURE OF HEALTH!”

“Not if you _keep talking,_ ” a second person yelled through the wall.

“WHY? I TALK ALL THE TIME! I LOVE TO TALK!”

“Papyrus, they already know that. Don’t talk to the wall-people.”

 “WHAT’S TALKING GOING TO DO TO ME?” Papyrus asked.

“ _I’m gonna beat the shit out of you, then go back to sleep!”_

“I’M AFRAID THAT’S IMPOSSIBLE, HUMAN. YOU SEE-“

“ _Papyrus,_ ” I hissed, dragging him away by his arm. “Let’s just go.”

“BUT I WAS MAKING FRIENDS!”

I sighed.  “Look, Papyrus, people like to sleep in on the weekends. It’s their day off, so they use it to catch up on their sleep, and they get kind of angry when you… wake… them…”

I trailed off, staring at the brand-new red convertible sparkling at me from across the street.

“…Papyrus, where’s your car?”

“RIGHT THERE!” He pointed at the convertible.

“ _That’s_ your car?”

“YES!”

“ _Jesus Christ._ ”

I watched as Papyrus ran at the car, cartwheeling over the door and into the driver’s seat.

“…How much did this cost?” I asked as I stumbled into the passenger’s seat.

“I HAVE NO IDEA! SANS BOUGHT IT FOR ME.”

“Didn’t he say he runs a hot dog stand?”

“YES. WHY?” Papyrus asked as the engine roared to life.

“Because, I don’t think… Never mind.”

We took off down the street.

Shit. _We took off down the street._

_Papyrus is driving. He’s responsible for your well-being. Papyrus, who shouts everything he says, starts conversations with angry strangers, and just front-flipped into a car. A very fast car, which you’re now riding in._

_Fuck._

“Papyrus, when did you get your license, again?”

“TWO WEEKS AGO! AND IT ONLY TOOK ME THREE ATTEMPTS!"

“That’s… That’s fantastic, dude.”

_I am going to die._

I winced as we screeched to a stop at an intersection.

“DO YOU WANT ME TO TURN ON THE RADIO?”

“W-Whatever’s cool with you, dude,” I squeaked.

“I WANT TO KEEP TALKING!”

“…Okay.”

“…AREN’T HUMANS SUPPOSED TO BREATHE?”

“I’ll get to that in a second.”

“OKAY. MAKE SURE YOU DON’T PASS OUT!” Papyrus advised as the light changed and we lurched forward.

_I’m going to die I’m going to die I’m going to die I’m going to die._

“ _Kwuggah cah fonda way_?!” I asked.

“WHAT?”

“…coffee. I need coffee. Can we get coffee? I would like some coffee. I would prefer to die caffeinated.”

I pointed at a bakery on the other side of the street.

“Here’s good.”

Papyrus made an immediate U-turn and pulled into a parking space. I watched the driver we’d almost clipped flip us off as they drove past.

“Right. So, uh… I’ll be right back. You want anything?

“I’M FINE.” Papyrus took a thermos out of the cup holder and held it up. “I’VE GOT SPAGHETTI!”

“…What’s in the thermos?”

“SPAGHETTI,” he repeated.

“…Right. I’ma go get some coffee.”

The bakery had a _HELP WANTED_ sign hanging in the window. _HELP WANTED_! I checked my coat pocket to make sure I still had a resume and prepared to make my entrance in a way that said “I am not a fuck-up.” I strode confidently towards the door, focusing on positively _exuding_ competence.

I pushed at the door and walked into it with a loud _BANG!_

_So much for the entrance._

“YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO PULL IT!” Papyrus offered helpfully.

“Thank you, Papyrus.”

“YOU’RE WELCOME!”

I looked at the _PULL_ sign attached to the back of the door, pulled it open and walked into the bakery.

“You guys open yet? Hello?”

I looked around. If the cases next to the counter hadn’t been filled with baked goods, I would’ve assumed the building was deserted. You know, with the cobwebs and everything.

“Hey! Watch it!” someone growled.

“Shit. Sorry. Uh…” I looked around the bakery.

The lights flickered on.

Spiders. Spiders everywhere. Spiders the size of my hand, spiders the size of… maybe a cocker spaniel or something, and every size in between. Just… fucking everywhere, spidering it up.

_Yes._

_Hell yes._

_Hell._

_Fucking._

_Yes._

I _needed_ this job.

“…Down here.”

There was a spider at my feet. Black and hairy and, compared to the other spiders I saw scuttling around the bakery, very small.

“You’re supposed to pull that door. We have a sign,” he rasped.

“Yeah, thanks. As you can see, I figured that out.”

I blinked, trying to collect my thoughts. “…Is bending down rude? I know that shit’s condescending when you’re talking to someone in a wheelchair, but wheelchairs usually aren’t, you know. A couple inches tall. I was going to ask what was up with the spider theme on the sign, but, uh…”

“Yeah. It’s kind of obvious,” the spider growled. How does something that small have a voice like that?

“Oh, and if you bend down, I’ll climb you and punch you in the face. Eight times at once.”

“Isn’t that just jumping off of me?”

“…Seven times at once," said raspy-spider. “You’re, uh… You’re pretty chill about being surrounded by spiders, huh?”

“Oh, no, I just hide it well. I only like puppies and kittens and small, fuzzy things.”

“…Spiders are small and fuzzy.”

I shrugged. “Well, shit, guess I like spiders then. You guys open yet?”

“Dunno. Ask her.” He pointed a leg at the cashier. I guess she was a spider? She looked generally spider-like. Eight limbs. Fangs. Odd number of eyes, though. Oh, and hair. And a horizontal mouth. And hands.

So, basically, almost nothing like a spider. Monster physiology is fucking weird. I glanced at the chalkboard above her and froze. It may have been the lack of coffee, but the movement of the spiders behind her was _hypnotic._ Nothing alive should be that coordinated: not ants, not bees, _definitely_ not spiders.

It pissed me off. What gave these guys _any right_ to be that coordinated around someone who’d once smacked himself in the face while eating? Stupid fucking organized spiders. I watched them swirl in and out of the kitchen, carrying trays and working machinery. I lost myself in the vortex. Time stood still.

_This is it. This is how you die. “Local Goblin-Man Starves to Death in Bakery; Last Words ‘Come Join Me in the Spiral’”._

The cashier clapped her hands.

 “Can I _help_ you?”

“ _Ah!_ Ah, shit, sorry. Yes. Yes, please. Thank you. Uh…”

The spiders began to suck me back in.

“…God _damn_ , that is organized.”

She nodded. “Yes, isn’t it lovely? Like a synchronized dance.”

I averted my gaze. “Hey, are you guys open yet? The door’s unlocked, so, uh…”

“Your hours aren’t listed,” I explained. “…You’re open, right?”

“For the last hour or so, yes. Can I interest you in a spider pastry? All proceeds go to real spiders~”

I stared at the pastries. The _pastries_. I did not look at the hypnotic spider death-spiral. What spiders? I didn’t see any spiders. Certainly not on the wall behind the- _NO._ “Thanks, can I please get a small coffee and, uh… Got anything with eggs in it?”

“…Eggs?”

“Eggs.”

“We have... _vegan_ options, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“No, I mean like, _eggs_. Eggs are an absolutely critical breakfast component. Do you have, like… quiche, or something?”

The cashier frowned. “…No.”

“Oh. Alright, sorry. I’ll just get a, uh… Can I get a chocolate croissant, please? Thanks.”

“Of course, dearie~ Your order comes to eleven dollars and fifty-eight cents.”

"Thanks," I said as I keyed my PIN in. Wait, how much did she just say this cost?

"Wait, sorry, how much did you say this was, again? Sorry."

"Eleven dollars and fifty-eight cents," she repeated.

_Jesus, that was twelve bucks?_

“Actually, can I…”

I watched as the spiders swirled away from a sign on the wall reading _NO REFUNDS_.

“Is it too late to change my order?”

The cashier gave me a thin, tight-lipped smile.

“...Yes.”

“Uh, never mind. Sorry. I'll just... get the croissant. And coffee. Thanks."

Three spiders brought out a croissant on a paper plate and a ceramic mug full of coffee. I cleared my throat. “…can I please get this to-go?”

“Would you like your croissant in a bag?”

“I’d like my coffee in a to-go cup. You know, the paper ones?”

She smiled again. “Those will be out shortly.”

I drummed my fingers on the counter and examined the webs on the ceiling.

_Okay, that’s an orb web. Triangle web. Orb web. Orb web. Triangle web. Orb web. Ooh, sheet web!_

_Triangle web. Orb web. Orb web. Orb web. Orb web. Orb web._

Fuck, _orb webs are boring._

“Can I interest you in anything else while you wait? Possibly one of these lovely travel mugs?”

The cashier held one up for inspection. I was familiar with the design. Simple, recycled plastic, eventually started leaching this weird aftertaste into anything hot. Probably about five bucks.

“Only fifteen dollars.”

“Fifteen bucks?”

“Yes~!”

“Are you _sure_ about that? Because the University of Ebott gift shop sells-“

“Well, we’re not the University of Ebott, are we, dearie?”

“No. No you’re not.”

We lapsed back into silence, made more awkward by the fact that the cashier kept... _staring_ at me. She never looked away, she never said anything, she didn't even move except to lick her lips. I couldn't tell if it was because they were dry, or if it was a tic or something.

It was probably a tic. Or something. She was doing it a lot.

_The job! Right! The job._

I cleared my throat. “You guys aren’t, uh, you’re hiring, right?”

“We need a cashier, yes. Someone tall enough to reach the register while I’m back in my office.”

“Awesome! I’ve got _shitloads_ of experience… uh, shit, not shitloads, assloads, fuck, I... _I have experience as a cashier!_ ”

_I’m a professional!_

I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out the wrinkled resume of shame.

“Here’s my resume. It’s kinda, uh, kind of wrinkled. Because I had it in my pocket. Wasn’t expecting to apply anywhere today.”

The crumpled ball of sadness plopped onto the counter. The cashier stared at it with the sort of disdain people typically reserve for unidentified organic substances stuck to the bottom of their shoe.

“It looks kind of like a lumpy pile of failure,” observed one of the spiders.

I cleared my throat. “Well, you know, the important part of a resume is that it’s well-written and professional-looking.”

“You mean like ‘not crumpled into a ball?’” asked another spider.

 “…Also, it might be a little blurry from the rain yesterday,” I said as I smoothed the resume out.

The cashier frowned. “…I’m sure.”

“Right. So, uh, if you could look that over as soon as it’s convenient, I’d really appreciate it. I look forward to hearing back from you. _Thanks._ ”

"We have applications."

"Oh," I said quietly. "That's... awesome. Yes."

"They're online."

"...Oh."

I pointed at a table. “I’m just gonna, uh, sit down, here. I actually don’t have to be anywhere until ten, so-“

“Is that your car out front?” asked the cashier, pointing out the window.

I turned around. Papyrus stopped sucking spaghetti out of his thermos and waved at me. Wait, was a spider crawling on me? I looked down at my leg. Nothing. Just my imagination.

“Nah. That’s my… my friend’s. Why?”

“Oh. No reason~” she said as she ducked behind the counter.

“Oh, look, here they are! Right there, the entire time. Silly me~” She set a cup down on the counter.

“Thanks,” I said as I poured my coffee into the cup. “Awesome. Thanks. Have a good one.”

“See you again, dearie!”

“You too. Have a good one. Thanks.” I shuffled out of the bakery, keeping an eye on my feet and eventually making my way back to the convertible.

“HUMAN, YOU’RE BACK!” Papyrus exclaimed, wiping a small amount of marinara sauce off his lip. His jaw. Whatever the fuck you have above your teeth when you don’t have lips. “WHAT TOOK SO LONG?”

“…No idea,” I mumbled as I got in the car. “I don’t wanna talk about it until I have my coffee. I have coffee, now I just need contemplation.”

I sipped my coffee and nearly lost the skin on my lips. I groaned, barely managing to avoid spitting coffee all over the car, and eventually swallowed the molten hell-juice, shuddering as it flowed down my throat and eventually cooled to form igneous rock in my stomach.

 “SANS DRINKS COFFEE, TOO. PERSONALLY, I DON’T SEE THE APPEAL, BUT I APPROVE OF ANYTHING THAT GETS HIM OUT OF BED IN THE MORNING.”

“Mmm. Yup. Coffee keeps me functional. Kind of.”

Papyrus turned to me. “THAT’S WHAT HE SAYS, TOO! ‘coffee’s the only thing keeping me going, bro.’”

There was a jolt as we rode up along the curb.

“The road, Papyrus! _The road!_ ”

“OH! RIGHT!” Papyrus returned his attention to the road. After a few seconds, he resumed speaking.

“…HUMAN, CAN I TELL YOU SOMETHING? YOU HAVE TO KEEP IT A SECRET FROM MY BROTHER.”

“If you’re fine telling secrets to a guy you just met last night, sure, go ahead.”

“I WORRY ABOUT SANS. ALL THE TIME. MY BROTHER… ISN’T THE HEALTHIEST MONSTER IN THE WORLD. HE HAS AN HP OF ONE. _ONE!_ ”

“…This is the part where I go 'What’s HP?' Right?”

“IT’S SHORT FOR HOPE. A MONSTER’S ABILITY TO KEEP THEIR SOUL TOGETHER.”

“IF IT DROPS TO ZERO, THEN…”

Papyrus trailed off.

“WOULD YOU LIKE TO LISTEN TO THE RADIO? I’D LIKE TO LISTEN TO THE RADIO. WE SHOULD TURN ON THE RADIO.”

Papyrus turned on the radio as we merged into heavy traffic.

_"-you can count on me! ‘Cause you need a monster…”_

_Ugh. Mettaton._

I don’t have anything against Mettaton. It’s just… I like my pop songs to have a little more _bounce_ , you know? Also, I’m pretty sure throwing that much glitter around violates some kind of environmental regulation. Cool cooking show, though. I never knew a chainsaw could be used as a cooking utensil.

“ _Your happiness and mine are entwined, and I live to be live, it’s in myyy design! I was built to be loved, and darling, so were you! We were made for-”_

I reached for the radio. “Papyrus, mind if I change the station?”

“WHY? I LIKE METTATON!”

“I’m just not feeling it right now.”

I changed the station.

“ _…let those_ _THINGS_ _come in and take our jobs! Lemme tell ya what we should do, is-”_

“…WE SHOULD TRY ANOTHER STATION,” said Papyrus, hurriedly.

“Yes,” I agreed, “let’s.”

Papyrus quickly changed the station, flipping through the channels.

“ _…isolated showers…_ ”

“ _…It’s a real get-together._ ”

“… _So COME ON IN for some fantastic…_ ”

_“…twenty-four-seven classic rock…”_

_“…I find it kind of funny, I find it kind of sad…”_

I tuned the radio out and stared out the window, absent-mindedly chewing my nails.

_Hey, there’s the fire department. What’s that sign out front say? “PLEASE STOP UNDYNE.”_

_Wait, is that “please stop, Undyne,” or “please, stop Undyne?” Who the hell is Undyne?_

_…Maybe it’s an acronym. UNDYNE._

_United… Nations Do-it -Yourself Negation of Explosives._

_Nanufacture of explosives. ENgineering of Explosives._

_University of Nebraska Do-it-Yourself eNgineering of Explosives._

_Unlicensed Naptha, Dynamite, Yard waste, and Nasty shit… Entities?_

_Ooh! Dog! DOG! DOG! HI DOG!_

_Look at that happy dog._

_Doooooooog._

_…Have I had a cigarette yet this morning? Shit._

_Shiiiiiiiit._

Someone was currently turning the white noise in my head up to maximum volume. If I go without cigarettes for more than four hours, my head gets all... fuzzy. I'm just _gone_. Lights are out, nobody's home. Then comes the headache, the chest pains, the muscle tension, and hunger. Addiction, I'm fine with, but withdrawal _suuuuuuuucks._

 _Just… occupy yourself,_ I thought as I drummed my fingers on the dashboard. _Watch the scenery crawl by. You’ll probably be at the smoke any second. The museum. The museum any smokeond._

_Fuck._

_I’m in a convertible, right? Is smoking that big an issue?_

_I_ am _sitting right next to Papyrus, though._

_Maybe if I got out and jogged along next to the car?_

“Hey, Papyrus, you think if I got-“

“WE’RE HERE!”

“What?”

“I SAID ‘WE’RE HERE!’”

“Thank _fuck,_ ” I sighed as we pulled into a parking spot.

_Smoke smoke smoke smoke smoke…_

“…SO, WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE KIND OF PUZZLE?”

_God. Damn. It._

“I… Fuck, dude, Idunno. I used to be fucking crazy about Sudoku, but I lost interest in it. Anyway, I’ll-”

“BECAUSE IT’S BORING, RIGHT? PERSONALLY, I DON’T LIKE SUDOKU. THERE’S NO THOUGHT PROCESS, NO FLASH OF INSPIRATION. YOU JUST TRY DIFFERENT COMBINATIONS OF NUMBERS UNTIL YOU FIND ONE THAT WORKS. IT’S BRUTE FORCE, ALL THE WAY THROUGH.”

I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. But I love that moment when you find the last piece of the puzzle and everything just cascades outwards, y’know?”

“Anyway, can’t you solve pretty much any puzzle by brute force?”

Papyrus beamed. “I AIM TO MAKE THAT AS HARD AS POSSIBLE.”

I snapped my fingers. “Oh, what about crosswords?”

Papyrus groaned. “UGH, CROSSWORDS. CROSSWORDS ARE BARELY PUZZLES. THEY’RE MORE LIKE… TESTS OF HOW MANY WORDS YOU CAN MEMORIZE.”

 “Yeah. I’ve never even finished a crossword. If I wanted to regurgitate a dictionary over everything, I’d be, like… an MRA or some shit.”

“…WHAT?”

“You know, like ‘as a rational, objective intellectual, the multiple posts I have perused on this subject, used in conjunction with the online thesaurus I have open in one tab and the copy of _The Eye of Argon_ I have open in another, then presented in a manner resembling the shut-in lovechild of an anime villain and a Lovecraft protagonist who’s trying to pad an essay, prove that there is a vast conspiracy to prevent me from sexual gratification, rather than that I need to work on my people skills, i.e. "acting like a person."

“Furthermore," I continued, pumping my clenched fist back and forth, "I will have you know that claiming I argue in bad faith is an _ad hominem_ fallacy, and the fact that this conversation consists of me moving the goalpoasts while making increasingly asinine counter-arguments is indicative of your inability to satisfactorily answer my questions, rather than any ulterior motive on my part. Blerk blerk, blerk, pretension, fart noises, something about iocaine powder, won’t shut up until you track me down and make me _eat_ my gaming rig and shove every sword I own up my ass like a shitty stainless-steel peacock, my favorite movie is _Idiocracy,_ blerk.”

Papyrus stared at me blankly.

"Blerk," I explained.

Papyrus continued to stare.

“...They’re, like… these guys. On the internet. That crawl out of the woodwork whenever someone wants to be treated like a hum-, like a person and bludgeon them into submission with a thesaurus."

Papyrus said nothing. I stepped out of the car.

“…I need a cigarette.”

“CAN YOU PASS ME THE GRAPH PAPER IN THE GLOVE COMPARTMENT BEFORE YOU GO?”

“Sure.”

“AND A PENCIL, THANK YOU.”

"Sure."

As I walked away from the car I took my phone out and checked my messages.

_Ooh, one new message. Maybe someone actually read my applications!_

I checked the number. 666-666.

_That’s… Probably just a glitch._

“H… DOO… EH…? IT… AST… EY! C… EAR? …EY! …OU HEAR ME?”

Yeah, something was definitely wrong with the call. The parts that had come were... _wrong_. Distorted in a way I’d never heard from a phone before. Like a storm warning and a dial-up modem had a baby, and the baby monitor had a major issue with... static, or something.

“HHHEEEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYY,” the mystery caller slurred into the phone.

“HEY. HEY. HEY. HEEEEEEYYY.”

“HEYYYYYY. I'VE BEEN LOOKING AT THAT SSSS-… THAT _THING_ YOU BROUGHT ME... HONESTLY, IT'S FREAKING ME OUT.”

“I THINK WE’RE GETTING INTO SOME VERY MURKY SHIT, HERE. I HAVEN'T SLEPT IN... THREE DAYS? THREE DAYS. I HAVEN'T SLEPT IN THREE DAYS, I HAVE MADE NO PROGRESS ASIDE FROM RESISTING THE URGE TO LIGHT ALL MY WORK ON FIRE AND RUN SCREAMING INTO THE WILDERNESS, AND I AM NOW VERY, VERY DRUNK. THIS ISN'T... IT'S NOT MY AREA OF EXPERTISE, SO I THOUGHT-“

I stopped the message.

“WHO WAS THAT?” Papyrus asked.

I shrugged. “Drunk-dial.”

Papyrus watched as I stomped my cigarette out. “DID YOU KNOW SMOKING DAMAGES YOUR LUNGS?”

“Yes.”

“DID YOU KNOW IT WILL KILL YOU?”

“Yes.”

Papyrus frowned. “…SO WHY DO YOU DO IT?”

“Because smoking makes all the stress just _meeeeeelt_ away. And it gives me something when I don’t know what to do with my hands.”

“YOU HOLD THINGS WITH THEM. LIKE THIS:” Papyrus waved his pencil around to demonstrate.

I grunted. “That’s awesome, Papyrus. I’ma walk over here, alright?” I said as I turned and walked away from the car.

“OKAY! THE MUSEUM OPENS IN TWO HOURS! DON’T BE LATE!”

“Don’t worry, I won’t.”

I walked to the edge of the parking lot and watched what appeared to be a cat monster and an alligator – crocodile? – pushing another cat over to an ice cream cart.

“C’mon,” began the purple cat, “he’s, like, _totally_ into you!”

“No,” said the orange cat, “he’s not. No one’s into me. This was a mistake. This was a _mistake!_ ”

“You gotta ask him out. You gotta!”

“No,” Orange repeated. “No I don’t. I could walk away. Or just, y’know, die. Right here.”

“…Can you, like, grab his legs?”

I watched as Allidile grabbed Orange by the ankles and lifted him up like a stretcher.

“Hey, I just remembered, I volunteered for a shift at, uh, eight, and I need to get going. _Right now._ ”

“Hey!”

Purple lost her grip. Orange took the opportunity to break free and bolt away. With whatever the fuck just happened over, I shifted my attention to a flock of crows perched in the branches of a nearby tree.

I like crows.

“Hello, crows!” I called as the biggest raven I'd ever seen hopped down onto the lowest branch. “And, uh, raven. Big raven. Super-Raven. Hello, raven!” The raven fixed its blank, beady gaze on me.

 “Though your crest be shorn and shaven,” I quoted, “thou surely art no craven; tell me what thy name is upon night’s plutonian-“

“ _Death,_ ” the raven croaked. “Death and woe! The hanged man! The seventh seal!”

 _Fantastic. First I have to wake up at five, then I get a fucking withdrawal headache, now there’s a fucking giant raven foretelling doom. Fantastic. Anything else? Lightning, perhaps? Spontaneous human combustion? Meteorite? Papyrus gonna run my ass over? Maybe my lighter could fucking EXPLODE?_ _Anything?_

“The sky ablaze, and yourself dead in a fursuit in the dumpster behind a Burger King! Death. _Death!_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Will's theoretical neckbeard gets his smug sense of superiority from the anime villain, and his prose and political views from the Lovecraftian side of the family.


	5. PAPYRUS! HE SMELLS LIKE THE MOON

And then the raven burst out laughing.

“Oh. Monster raven.” I watched as they fell off the branch and sprawled, wheezing, on the ground. “I, uh, should have picked up on that. Sorry.”

They just kept laughing. How the _fuck_ did I respond to this?

“Oh god. Ooooh, god,” they wheezed as they stood up and looked at me. "You're, uh... You're supposed to be surprised."

"I am. This is my surprised face."

"That's the face you made before I started talking."

"Yeah, but... I think I raised my eyebrows. Did I raise my eyebrows?"

"A little," they admitted. "...You aren't very expressive, are you?"

"Nope," I said flatly. “So do you just, like, fly around pulling prophecies of doom out of your ass?”

“No. The possibilities with these guys are just… just _endless_. Watch this: _fuck you!_ ”

“Fuck you! Fuck you!” the crows echoed.

“See that? They fucking love me. I’m, like, their queen.”

I observed the flock of crows, now loudly telling me to fuck a cactus. Exact words.

“Fuck a cactus! Fuck a cactus!”

I was honestly a little jealous. If I had an army of crows, I'd train them to go around swearing at people, too. If they passed that knowledge on to other crows, I could probably have every crow in North America insulting passersby within the decade. Of course, I'd also train my crow army to attack on command. What's the point of having an army of crows if you can't send them after your enemies? I wanted my own crow army. I could wear, like, a ragged black cloak and a deer skull. Get some sort of twisted forest-spirit aesthetic going. Spend all my time hanging out in the deep woods, foraging, and pointing and screaming at hikers until the foul-mouthed beasts of the wild dive-bomb them and chase them off.

...Actually, that might be my ideal lifestyle.

“How the _fuck_ did you manage that? Bring ‘em food or some shit?”

“Brought them food, brought them _to_ food, trained them to follow me. They’re, like… super fucking good at learning?”

I nodded. “Yup. Corvids are scary fucking smart. You know they can share physical descriptions? A bunch of scientists put on masks and went around fucking with them and tagging them. Little while later, tagless crows started dive-bombing anyone with the same mask. Across _multiple generations!_ ”

“Huh.”

I took her noncommittal grunt for approval. “I _fucking love crows_ , dude! Corvids in general. Seriously, I could go on for hours. Like, did you know-”

“ _Anyway,_ I’m Grip. What did you say your name was again?”

“Will. You said your name was Grist?”

“Grip! It’s short for Agrippina.”

"Will."

I stuck my hands in my pockets. Okay, corvids. What else did I know about corvids?

“…Did you know magpies can recognize themselves in a mir-“

“I should go,” Grip said hurriedly. That seemed fair enough: the joke was played out here. Might as well go try it with someone else.

“Okay! Later, dude!”

“No,” she stated flatly as she took off with the flock behind her.

“Hey, train them to shit on command!” I shouted after them.

I like crows.

_Well, that was interesting. Better go back and check on Papyrus before he tries to make friends with a mugger or something._

Papyrus was still engrossed in… whatever the hell he was sketching. A puzzle, probably. It was kind of scary: I’d never seen him sit still _and_ stay quiet for this long. If I had to describe Papyrus in one word, it would be “talkative.” Or maybe “loud.”

“Hey, Papyrus,” I called.

“HELLO, HUMAN!”

“…Whatcha makin’?”

“A PUZZLE!”

“…So I guessed.”

Papyrus went back to scratching on the graph paper. I’d expected him to describe what he was making or ask me an embarrassing personal question. At least now I knew that he was still alive, and hadn’t suddenly been replaced by a doppelganger or something. I guess when he focuses on something, he _focuses_ on it _._ Focuses the _fuck_ out of that shit.

Worked for me. I took advantage of the fact that he’d finally stopped talking to eat my croissant. It was a good croissant. Crisp and flaky on the outside. Good filling-to-pastry ratio. The chocolate chips studded on the outside were a nice touch.

_Wait, corvids can solve puzzles. Like, complicated ones. I bet Papyrus would be interested in that._

“Hey, Fuhfius,” I mumbled through a mouthful of chocolate.

“WHAT?”

“…Did you know ravens can solve puzzles?”

“REALLY?”

“Yeah. Like, if you put a piece of meat on a string dangling from a branch, they’ll figure out that they need to hold onto it to pull it up instead of just letting it drop.”

Papyrus considered this. “…THAT’S NOT MUCH OF A PUZZLE.”

“Yeah, but try getting a goose to figure that shit out. You can’t, because past what I’ve dubbed the ‘Duck Threshold,’ birds get exponentially dumber and meaner as their size increases.”

“DID YOU LEARN THAT BEFORE OR AFTER YOU QUIT WORKING AT THE ZOO?”

Godammit, why was Papyrus so obsessed with that?

Oh, right. The hyper-focus thing.

I sighed. “Wow, you’re, uh… Really fixated on that, aren’t you?”

“THE LAST TIME I ASKED, YOU DIDN’T ANSWER!”

“Will you keep asking until I do?”

“YES!” Papyrus said brightly.

“Okay, Papyrus, look, I got _fired,_ okay? It goes like this:”

“First off, there was a flock of Canada geese in the park. They stayed there because people kept feeding them, even though they shit everywhere and harassed the animals.”

“Now, it was Saturday, so we were already crowded, and I was in a bad mood because the guests are complaining about me telling them what they can and can't do with the animals, like... fuck's sake, even if we didn't put the signs up for a _reason_ , the animal kingdom doesn't exist solely for your amusement, you know?"

“So, anyway, I'd just broken my record for going 'I can't stop you, but this warning means you can't sue us if you get mauled, and if some mixture of pain and fear and the shit you're throwing in the enclosures gets one of the animals sick, we can hold you responsible for property damage' in one day, so I’m already in a bad mood, when I realize that the geese are swarming for some reason, and there’s a kid next to them.”

“I start keeping an eye on this kid, and sure enough he starts fucking _walking towards the enraged fucking geese_ with half a burger. Then he decides that he’s still hungry, or something, and he decides he’s going to walk away. With the burger. While the geese are watching him.”

“They don’t like that, so they start swarming the kid, and he’s screaming and covering his head with the geese around him while whoever’s supposed to be watching him has fucked off to fuck-if-I-know-where. I charge in and drag the kid and his burger away, and the geese are biting me – did you know geese have teeth?”

“NO.”

“…Geese have teeth.”

“So, anyway, they’re chasing after us, and I’ve opened the door to the tamarin enclosure where they can’t follow us when, _finally_ , his parents start fucking paying attention to him – never mind that he was screaming when he started getting swarmed and they didn’t give a shit - and they’re all like ‘ragh, ragh, get your hands off my son. What are you doing with my son?’ and I'm pissed off, so instead of just explaining what’s going on, I’m like ‘if I _was_ trying to take your kid, he'd be long fucking gone because you _can’t fucking pay attention to him while he’s fucking with an angry mob of geese.’_ This, of course, sets the parents of the year off – keep in mind this is happening while the geese are still rampaging in the background – and we start arguing _while the door is still open_.”

“So, we’re cussing each other out, and out of the corner of my eye I see one of the tamarins go by, and I’m thinking ‘wait, is that inside or outside the enclosure? Outside? Nah, that can’t be a tamarin, because they’re all inside the- _oh, shit, the cage is open_!’”

“And then Burgerboy runs between us. With the geese following him. Again. And they chased the tamarin off and got into the enclosure.”

“So, basically, I let a bunch of monkeys out and the geese chased them off, is what I’m saying. While I was swearing at the customers.”

“…OH.” Papyrus turned and stared off into the distance.

Geese. Fucking geese. I hate geese. Geese are Satan’s bath toys. They’re like wasps in bird form: all they know is hate.

 “YOU SURE SWEAR A LOT,” Papyrus said, finally.

“I know.”

“Don’t worry,” I assured, “they found all the fucking monkeys.”

“…THAT’S GOOD TO KNOW?”

“So what’s the puzzle?”

“IT’S A TILE PUZZLE!” Papyrus answered proudly, holding up a sheet of graph paper.

I studied the puzzle.

“This is just your face, repeated on a grid.”

“YOU HAVE TO ROTATE THEM UNTIL THEY ALL POINT THE RIGHT DIRECTION. BUT, TO MAKE IT MORE DIFFICULT, ALL THE TILES IN THE DIRECTION MY CHIN IS POINTING WILL ALSO ROTATE!”

“ALSO, IF YOU DON’T COMPLETE IT IN A SET NUMBER OF TURNS, IT SHOCKS YOU.”

“…what if you just reset it?”

“OOH, GOOD IDEA! IF YOU DON’T COMPLETE IT IN A SET NUMBER OF TURNS, IT SHOCKS YOU _AND_ RESETS!”

“No, I meant… Never mind. What’s up with the face here?”

I pointed to a tile in one corner labelled _B-H_. Cracks radiated from its right eye up to the top of the skull, and connected the right and the corner of the mouth.

“IT IS CRACKED FROM USE! AN EXTRA DETAIL, TO MAKE MY SKETCH MORE REALISTIC!”

“…huh. That is… really detailed.”

Aside from the faces, I had no idea what I was looking at. Gears, I think? Maybe a chain?

“Hey, Papyrus?”

“YES, HUMAN?”

“The teeth on the face here rub against the gear in the corner when they’re turning, right?”

“ONE GEAR FOR EVERY DIRECTION, YES!”

“…So how do you keep the gear from turning both chains at once?”

“WELL,” Papyrus began, “IT IS CONNECTED TO THE SAME AXLE AS TWO RATCHETS."

He pointed to what I'd thought was a buzz saw, but was apparently one of those wrenches that click around when you turn them the wrong way. I had no idea what that had to do with the puzzle, aside from maybe putting it together. Maybe if you attached a gear to it, it'd be able to turn one way but not the other?

"TURNING THE AXLE ONE WAY CAUSES THE FIRST RATCHET TO CATCH, TURNING A GEAR, WHICH TURNS ONE CHAIN. TURNING THE AXLE THE OTHER WAY CAUSES THE SECOND RATCHET TO CATCH, TURNING THE OTHER CHAIN.”

“And that chain turns all the gears in a row?”

“YES.”

“…How do you keep it from turning the gears it’s not pointing at?”

“…I DON’T KNOW.”

Papyrus frowned, turning my question over in his mind.

“OOH, WHAT IF I GAVE EACH GEAR ITS OWN CHAIN, CONNECTING ALL THE GEARS AFTER IT?”

“That sounds… really inefficient.”

“PUZZLES AREN’T SUPPOSED TO BE EFFICIENT! THEY’RE SUPPOSED TO BE COMPLICATED AND ANNOYING!”

“I meant like in terms of materials and the time to put it together.”

“THE GREAT PAPYRUS NEVER CUTS CORNERS! ESPECIALLY NOT ON PUZZLES!”

“Idunno, dude, that sounds like it would take up a _lot_ of space. The chains and gears are, what, an inch wide? Just hooking up one tile would take… hang on, six tiles, six chains, with the vertical that’s another six… the gears…”

“…That’d take a _shitload_ of space. Dude, you’d just have this giant tangle of chains.”

Papyrus rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I SUPPOSE I WOULD.”

“HMMM.”

“…These gears here turn the rest of the tiles, right?”

“YES.”

“What if you connected just two of them with a chain, then you connected the second to the next gear? Then you could make the first gear, like, slip or something when you turned it.”

“Or just hook up a circuit that closes when you turn it. Stick the faces on top of a motor, write some code, wire everything together. Boom, done.”

“NORMALLY, I WOULD, BUT I’M CURRENTLY IN THE MIDST OF A RETURN TO PUZZLE-MAKING'S ROOTS,” Papyrus explained. “MY PUZZLES DO NOT USE MOTORS, COMPUTERS, OR ELECTRICITY.”

“…Except when they shock you.”

“EXCEPT WHEN THEY SHOCK YOU!”

 Papyrus frowned.

“HUMAN?”

“Skeleton?”

“I’M GLAD TO MEET SOMEONE SO PASSIONATE ABOUT PUZZLES. YOU KNOW… BACK IN THE UNDERGROUND… I DIDN’T HAVE MANY FRIENDS. I HAD UNDYNE, MY BROTHER, AND, UH… THAT’S IT.”

 _No._ That wasn’t right.  Was it the shouting? It couldn’t be the shouting. Once you got past that, Papyrus was one of the most likable people I’ve ever met. He was like a giant, boney puppy.

Or, the best actor I’ve ever known, feeding me bullshit that I’ll never bring up in a conversation to gain my trust, for some nefarious purpose.

I decided to go with the first one.

“Papyrus?

“YES?”

“You deserve friends.”

I hugged him. I’d been aiming for the torso, but a combination of emotion, the fact that I had to lunge to reach his rib cage, and general lack of coordination resulted in me grabbing him by the back of the head and trying to smother him.

"Uh," I grunted. "That... uh, sor-"

“HUMAN, YOU APPEAR TO BE SQUEEZING MY FACE. IS THIS HOW HUMANS HUG? FRISK DIDN’T TELL ME THIS!”

“I WILL RETURN THE FAVOR!” Papyrus shouted as I awkwardly patted him on the back and moved to disengage.

Papyrus wrapped his arms around my head. He smelled like… gunpowder. Like used firecrackers.

“Whayu smewig fahgwagah?”

“WHAT?” he screamed in my ear.

“ _Afeh_ , whayu smewig gubahdah?”

Papyrus released my head.

“WHAT?” he repeated.

“ _Papyrus, you smell like gunpowder._ ”

“AND YOU SMELL LIKE TOBACCO SMOKE! AND…” Papyrus paused, searching for the right description.

“CANADA!”

He leaned in and sniffed my head.

“NO, WAIT, IT MIGHT BE ALASKA.”

“Are you going to stop smelling me?”

“NO, IT’S DEFINITELY CANADA.”

“…That’d be pine shower gel, maple lip balm, and possibly a little gin from last night.”

“I LIKE IT!”

“…Thanks. I like how you smell like… America? Or moondust. Did you know moondust smells like gunpowder? Apparently, everyone who’s walked on the moon or handled their equipment says it smells like someone lit off some fireworks or something.”

“I DID NOT!”

Papyrus went back to scribbling on his blueprint. I glanced at my phone. Just under two hours before the museum opened.

_Okay, decision time: do I drink the coffee, or catch some sleep?_

I took a sip of coffee. Whoever made it must have watched coffee murder their parents in an alley. It tasted like someone had boiled burnt mushrooms and cigarette butts with three coffee beans, then let it sit around for a week. Drinking the entire cup would _technically_ wake me up, but facing it at anything less than full strength would also probably kill me.

“…I’m gonna take a nap,” I mumbled as I closed my eyes. “Lemme know if you need anything.”

If Papyrus heard me, he didn’t give any indication. He stayed quiet as I drifted off to sleep, so I guess that was enough.

. . .

Something tapped on my shoulder.

“HUMAN!”

“Mmmwuh,” I replied.

“HUMAN, WAKE UP!”

“Nuh.”

Papyrus poked my shoulder.

“POOOOOOKE.”

“ _Mmmmmm._ ”

“HUMAN, IT IS TEN O’ CLOCK. IT IS TIME TO WAKE UP.”

“…Gimme five more minutes,” I mumbled as Papyrus picked me up and began carrying me… somewhere. “Mmm. Thanks.”

And then he dropped me.

“Fuck!” My eyes shot open as I hit the ground.

“SORRY. I CAN’T CARRY YOU AND OPEN THE DOOR AT THE SAME TIME. HAVE NO FEAR, ONCE WE’RE INSIDE, I WILL CONTINUE-“

“Can I go back and get my coffee?” I asked, walking back towards the car.

“OF COURSE! HERE, TAKE MY KEYS. CATCH!”

Something smacked into my back and clattered to the ground. I looked down and picked up a set of keys.

“Papyrus?”

“YES?”

“…Is this your car key?”

“YES.”

“…and your _house_ key?”

“YES.”

“Papyrus, your car’s a convertible. I can just reach in and grab my coffee.”

“OH, YEAH! CAN I HAVE MY KEYS BACK?”

“…Sure.” I tossed Papyrus’s keys to him. “I’ll meet you inside.”

Papyrus is an odd, odd man. He was genuine, though. I felt like I had a good feel of his personality after just a few hours in his company.

However, I couldn’t say the same of his brother, the inscrutable little fucker waiting by the car. Why was he _here?_ Why was he waiting next to an empty car, instead of in the museum with his brother? I ducked behind a car while I formulated a plan to get my coffee without having to talk to him.

“hey,” he called.

_Fuck._

I stood up and waved. “Heeeyyyy…”

“Uh...”

_Oh, shit. Oh shit oh shit oh shit._

_Sam? No, that’s not right. His brother is Papyrus. Their names are related to paper-making. Silk? Skin? Wood Pulp? It’s not Pulp, is it? No, it had an S. It’s alliterative. S... the Skeleton. I’m pretty sure it’s Skin._

_It’s definitely Skin._

“…Small Papyrus.”

“sans,” he corrected.

“Right. Sins. Hello."

"hello."

"Papyrus brought me here."

"so i see."

We stared at other in silence for several awkward seconds.

"Uh…” I pointed to the dried ketchup on his shirt. “You got a little, uh…”

“body. i know.”

“No, you’ve got some, uh… ketchup…” I trailed off as I fidgeted with my collar.

“…Did you know your brother just give his car keys to a guy he just met last night?”

“yeah. he does that.”

I grabbed my coffee and pointed off to the side of the parking lot. “Huh. Well, I need a cigarette, so I’ll probably go off over ther-“

“you can smoke right here if you wanna. i don’t mind.”

“ _Oh._ ”

“not like i’m gonna get lung cancer, or anything. whatever that is.”

“Yeah, but can you smell it?”

“yeah.”

I put my cigarette back in the pack. “Yeah, I’ll probably, uh, hold off.”

“how’d you sleep last night?”

Sleep? Why was he asking about sleep? Normally you only asked people about the weather or how they slept _after_ you ran out of conversation topics, right? I mean, I _guess_ we didn't have much to talk about. Maybe something about the art museum? Ooh, or crows.

I guess I'd slept alright, aside from Papyrus waking me up early. Didn't wake up in the middle of the night. No dreams, or at least nothing worth remembering.

“Alright. Why?”

“no reason. just thought I’d ask.”

“That’s, uh, nice of you. How’d you sleep?”

“a lot.”

“…Huh.”

I took an ice-cold swig of hell-coffee.

_Okay. Don’t just sit there in silence. Think of a conversation topic. Conversation. That thing people do._

“You know crows hold funerals? They’ll stand around a dead crow and place trinkets and shit on it.”

“huh. neat. y’know, a flock of crows told me the world was ending this morning.”

“They told me to go fuck myself.”

“they did that, too.”

“Huh.”

I went back to drinking my coffee.

“…how’s the coffee?”

“Cold. And it tastes like piss that someone put, like, half the recommended amount of coffee grounds in.”

“ew.”

“Yup,” I replied, staring off into the distance.

“…where’d you get it?”

“Uh, this new place downtown. Fucking overpriced. Spiders everywhere, though, so that’s nice.”

“oh, yeah, that place. frisk goes there all the time. thanks for warning me about the coffee.”

“Gave ‘em my resume and shit.”

Sans raised his eybrows. Or... widened his eye sockets, I guess. “they’re hiring?”

“Yeah.”

“other people?”

“Yeah. Why?”

“just surprised, i guess. historically, spiders have been kinda… what’s the word?”

“reclusive!” He finished.

“So you'd say they're recluses?” I asked, grinning.

“uh... yeah, i guess. why?”

“Oh. Uh… No reason.”

I pursed my lips and looked around at nothing in particular.

“hey, has anyone ever told you that you look like… when you’re looking for something to say, you make the same face as… what’s the name of that old puppet show?”

“Which one, Sesame Street?”

“yeah! wait, no.”

“Fraggle Rock?”

“nah.”

“…The Muppets?”

Sans snapped his fingers. Didn't you need skin for that? Fuck it; I'd already seen him wink at me. He snapped his fingers. “yeah, that one! you make the same face as that frog guy when you’re looking for something to say.”

“This is my nervous face,” I explained.

“…you always make that face.”

“Huh,” I said, pursing my lips. 

After several seconds, Sans spoke up again. “hey, can i ask you an honest question?”

“…What’s it about?”

“my brother.”

“…Sure, go ahead.”

“what do you think of him?”

“Hmm…”

“Honestly? Nicest guy I’ve ever met.”

I gulped down the last of my coffee.

“…It kind of worries me.”

Sans sighed.

“yeah. me too."

 

"...a couple months ago he told me 'papyrus! he smalls like the moon.'"

"i still have no idea what that means."

"...It means he smells like the moon, Sans."

you done?”

“Yeah.”

“i can hold on to your cup if you want,” Sans said, taking the cup out of my hands.

“Nah, it’s fine. I can… Uh…”

I stared at Sans, empty-handed, with no sign of my cup. I scanned the ground around him. No bushes, no storm drains, nothing. Nowhere you could hide something. No bulge in his pockets, either.

“…what?”

“…Nothing. I’ll follow you.”

Sans shoved his hands in his pockets and set off towards the entrance. “sounds like a plan.”

I shuffled along behind Sans. Yes. _Behind_ Sans. Where he’d have to turn his head more than ninety degrees to keep talking to me. I missed Papyrus. When Papyrus was around, he always filled in the gaps in conversation for me.

Silence is awkward, but conversations are so, _so_ much worse. Without a specific conversation topic to stay on, I always end up blurting out something weird, or creepy, or embarrassing. Then I have to sit around mentally kicking myself while I’m in the bus or elevator or whatever with whoever I was talking to, then get out as fast as possible and accept that I can never, ever speak to that person again.

Sans slowed down to match my pace.

_Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck._

“Did you know that the bite of the Brazilian wandering spider causes priapism?” I blurted out.

“…i didn’t.”

“The bite of the Brazilian wandering spider causes priapism.”

“that’s… interesting?”

_Wait, does he know what priapism is? Can monsters get priapism? How does monster reproduction work?_

_…I probably_ shouldn’t _ask him about that._

“...where’d you say you were from, again?”

“Minnes _o_ ta.”

“huh. that’s a minnesota accent? i thought you were from... new jersey. or… the south. whatever the southern version of the new jersey is.”

“Florida,” I told him.

I stopped as we entered the museum. A sea of screaming children filled the main hall.

“God. Damn. It. This place just opened, why the _fuck_ is there a crowd?”

“looks like a field trip or something,” Sans observed.

“ _Fuuuuuuuuck._ ”

"oh, right, you don't like kids, do you?"

 “I don’t like _crowds_ ” I answered. “They’re loud, claustrophobic, and they freak me out. And kids are _really_ loud.”

The crowd almost drowned me out, illustrating my point.

"I’m fine with kids, it’s just when they’re unsupervised and loud and excited that I don’t like them."

"so... when they're kids."

"When they're let loose in the wrong place without someone to do the whole 'finger up, everyone quiet down,' thing. Kids are basically chaos in physical form. It'd be admirable, if they didn't occasionally take it too far and go all _Lord of the Flies_."

I sighed. “Man, now we have to wait in line. _”_

“don’t they just send a teacher in to buy a bunch of tickets, then hand them out?" Sans asked as we walked towards the counter. "that’s how they did it in the underground, anyway.”

“…I guess? That’s how I remember it, anyway.”

I cleared my throat.

“…Anyway, the problem is, if a kid’s an asshole, what’re you going to do? You can’t just start yelling at someone else’s kid, and you can’t tell their parents, because chances are the reason they act the way they do is the parents either don’t give a shit, or treat him like he’s royalty or some shit who can do no wrong, and he grows up with this sense of entitlement that lasts until he runs for presi- _Jesus, tickets are fifteen bucks._ ”

“Man,” I said, reaching into my pocket, “that’s, like… two packs of cigarettes. Pack-and-a-half."

"...Wait. Oh, _shit._ Uh…”

_Oh, no. Oh, god, fuck no. Nonononono. Fuck, fuck, fuck! Where the fuck is my wallet?!_

“…Sorry, do, uh, friends of the artist get in free?” I asked the clerk.

“...No.”

“Right. Sorry. Uh… you… have a good one. Sorry.”

I turned to Sans. “Hey, uh, you think if I walked along with the crowd, they’d think I was a teach-?“

“i’ve got it.”

“C’mon, you don’t have to do that.”

“can i get two tickets?”

“He means one. One ticket.”

Sans pressed his chin into the counter, waving his credit card in the air.

“uh… i can’t really… reach…”

He jumped and tossed his card onto the counter.

“…two tickets, please.”

“He means one.”

The clerk leaned over the counter, handing Sans his card and the tickets.

“Enjoy the museum!”

“Thanks,” I replied. “You too.”

“thanks. you too.”

“…Shit.”

“wait. shit.”

“You really didn’t have to do that,” I said as Sans handed me my ticket.

“well, papyrus kinda wants you to be here. besides, it’s not like i could just ditch you or anything.”

“Thanks, dude. Thank you. Seriously. I’ll pay you back. Want me to write an IOU?”

“nah, you don’t have to do that.” Wait, did he mean pay him back or write the IOU?

“I will write an IOU, right now. I’ll go back over to the ticket counter and-“

“wanna go through one of the side halls? paps doesn’t go on for about another half hour.”

“ _Yes. Please._ Before the horde starts pouring in.”

“you _really_ don’t like kids, do you?”

“ _No!_ Listen, dude, kids deserve as much love, support, and respect as their squishy little developing brains can handle, because some asshole decided to drag another person into this grinder, and somebody needs to offset that. Like, this one time, my kids got me a giant-ass turtleneck sweater for my birthday, and I used to wear that thing _all. The fucking. Time.”_

“Which is weird,” I added, “because I normally don’t wear turtlenecks.”

Sans froze.

“... _what?_ ”

“I don’t wear turtlenecks. I don't like the feeling of something _tight_ around my throat, you know? Feels like I'm being strang-”

“no, before that.”

“Oh, right. I was saying... uh..." 

Fuck, what _had_ I been talking about? I stopped, furrowed my brow, and began absent-mindedly chewing on my fingernail as I mentally retraced my steps. My wallet, sneaking in, paying Sans back, taking a detour...

"Oh!" I snapped my fingers, then stood there for several seconds.

“yeah?"

“…I don’t remember,” I admitted.

"kids."

"Right! I was a camp counselor for three years. Well, technically junior counselor. You don't take that job if you don't like kids, because they're pretty much determined to kill either themselves or each other, and the woods is the worst place for that. You have to alternate between doing arts and crafts, hiking, and going ‘don’t eat that.’ ‘Don’t climb on that.’ ‘Don’t stick your hand in that.’ ‘Don’t jump off the edge of that.’ 'Don't _push_ other kids off the edge of that.'"

“’Don’t fuck with that,’” I finished.

"doesn't sound that bad."

"'Okay, campers, today we're going to learn about orienteering!  Put Red Fred in the Shed, then turn- wait, where's Jimmy? Shit, guys, Jimmy's gone. Okay, new lesson plan! Today, we're going to learn how to track!'"

"...okay, that sounds bad."

“It was a regular occurrence. But, yeah, I try to- _Holy shit, that’s a viperfish!_ "

"That is a god damn viperfish!" I screamed as I ran over to the mural-looking thing on the ground. "Who the fuck is painting viperfish?”

“ _Abyss of the Deep_ , by Weiss Guertena,” I read aloud. “This. This is _beautiful._ ”

“what’s a viperfish?”

“They’re these fish that live thousands of feet under the ocean. They have these _giant_ fucking teeth and they light up to attract prey and they’re _awesome._ ”

I paused.

“Hang on, this might be actually be an anglerfish.”

I studied the painting. The teeth were too small for a viperfish, and the eyes were too far back on the head. It looked more like a viperfish than an anglerfish. Some kind of deep-sea fish, anyway. I guess Weiss had taken some artistic liberties with whatever this was supposed to be. If it was a real fish at all.

“you like art?” Sans asked.

I turned away from the painting.

“…What?”

“you seem pretty interested in the art. i was just wondering if you ever made anything.”

“Oh. _Oh._ ”

I shrugged. “I used to draw a lot. Doodling, you know. School. Took a class in high school, then again in college to try and learn how to sketch. Wasn’t very good at it. I don’t have the steadiest hands, even with the nicotine in my system.”

“did you like it?”

I shrugged again. “I guess? It killed time, anyway.”

“Almost failed the class in high school. We were supposed to do a series of drawings, and I opted to do a series of cute-looking ‘scary’ animals.”

“So, like, you’d have a snake squishing his face against the side of his enclosure, then in cut-and-paste, ransom note-looking letters I’d write ‘I’ll gladly disembowel you if I ever escape this cage,’ or a little brown bat captioned ‘I thirst for the souls of the innocent.’”

I wiggled my fingers in the universal ' _woooooo, spooooky!_ ' gesture for emphasis.

“Jumping spider: ‘My eggs can only gestate when laid in your skull.’ That kind of thing.”

_You should shut up, now. Stop talking about spiders and snakes and shit. Talk about, uh... something else._

“…huh," Sans grunted.

“Apparently, my teacher didn’t like sna-... _Look at that!_ Look!" I pointed to a group of kids pawing at the artwork. “ _That's_ what I’m talking about. You see that shit?”

For some goddamn reason, Sans walked over and tried to reason with them.

“hey, kiddos, you’re not supposed to touch the art.“

One child paused, hand still on the painting, considering this. He looked up at Sans, studying him for several seconds.

"...Fuck you."

“…okay," Sans said as the child turned and trundled away.

Sans walked back over to me.

“…And _that_ is why I’m terrified of children.”

“i like kids," Sans said. "kids are cute.” He looked back in the direction the hellspawn had walked off in. “…usually.”

“Kids go through cute _stages_ that they end up growing out of.”

“Like, babies: Babies are terrifying. They can’t be bargained with. They can’t be reasoned with. They absolutely will not stop, ever, until they put anything and everything into their slobbery little goblin mouths. What if someone hands one to you? _What the fuck are you supposed to do? How the hell do you hold them? What if you drop them? They’re crying why are they crying how do I make them stop?_ ”

“Toddlers,” I continued. “Cute until they get sick, then back to terrifying. Have you ever met a toddler who covers their mouth? You haven’t, because toddlers are biological weapons mass-produced at day-cares and designed to get excited, run up to you, and spew their payload straight into your face before going back to the day-care to reload.”

“Kids. Like, little, little kids. Like, preschool age. Cute. This little kid started following me around once, so I asked her her name, and she said…”

I slowly held up three fingers.

“…On the other hand, I also knew this kid who communicated by biting, and one time this little old lady came up to him, said ‘ _oh, what a sweet boy_ ,’ and he growled at her.”

“…It was me,” I added quietly.

_Fucker kept taking my Handy-Dandy Notebook. He deserved those tooth marks._

_Jackass._

“ _Anyway_ , they stay cute until about seven, then their personalities _really_ start forming and some of them start turning into little assholes. Like the kid who kept making fun of my lisp and stole my Pokémon cards.”

_I bit him, too._

“After that, they’re just… _kids_ , I guess. Indicative of the environment they grow in."

I waved my hand towards where Hellspawn had been.

“Oh, hey!"

"what?"

"Wanna see if we can find any ugly Renaissance babies?”

“...i guess?”

Sans looked around the gallery.

“…i don’t get art.”

“Honestly, neither do I. That's why I suggested looking for Renaissance babies, because holy _shit_ are they hilarious. You don't need an art degree to appreciate a fucked-up looking baby."

“I may not know much….” I added softly.

“…but?”

“What?”

“i may not know much, but…?”

“Oh yeah, totally. I’m no proctologist.”

“no, b-u-t.”

“But, what?”

"...never mind."

We started walking again.

“I guess I _have_ seen a couple art films. Like _The Room._ Now _that’_ s art.”

“i’ve heard of that. isn’t it supposed to be bad?”

“It’s the _Citizen Kane_ of bad movies.”

“huh.”

"...Or The _Mangler._ A heartwarming family comedy about a girl saving her elderly uncle’s business from..."

I stopped, assaulted by the noise of the main hall. This was an art museum. It was supposed to be _quiet._

"...debt."

Sans stopped and turned around.

“you coming?”

 “…Wanna check out the second floor?” I asked.

“sure. there’re some stairs at the back here.”

"No, I meant, like..."

Wait, finding a second set of stairs was never an option. This hallway looped back around. If there were stairs, I would have seen them. Shit.

“…okay.”

_Oh god so many people noise noise noise NOISE._

“Dude, where the fuck even _is_ the exhibit?”

“second floor, other side of the museum.”

“What?!”

“on the second floor.”

“ _What?!_ ”

“second! floor!”

I had no fucking clue what Sans was saying. I followed him anyway, doing my best to tune out the crowd. It didn’t work. Their chatter wasn’t a noise, it was a _presence_ , washing over me and through me, bouncing around inside my skull.

At the top of the staircase, Sans turned to me again.

“you okay?” He asked.

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”

“you look a little… shaken up, or something.”

“I always look like this.”

Sans considered this, then nodded. “...oh, yeah. okay, then. exhibit’s this way.” He pointed down the hall.

Man, we passed right by the antiquities. I bet they had, like, sarcophagi, or some shit. I considered splitting up with Sans, then thought better of it. I had no fucking clue where I was going. I watched a dancing mushroom squeak past us on a wagon, pulled by… some kind of cat-dog? Dog-cat?

“any idea what that guy’s deal is?” I asked, jerking my head in the mushroom’s direction.

“that’s ragel. he wants to be in the museum. they’ve ignored the interpretive dance videos he keeps sending in, so now he’s started just kinda… coming in. and dancing.”

“How the fuck do you exhibit someone dancing? You’d need, like… a stage.”

“or you could have bob pull you around the museum in a wagon. while you dance.”

I nodded. Performance art, I guess. Or something. I stopped and looked at the doorway ahead of us. Was that it? Papyrus was there, but I didn't see any puzzles. Not even one that they'd cordoned off. I pointed at the doorway. “That’s, uh… that’s not the exhibit, is it?”

“that’s it.”

As we walked in, I took a look around the exhibit. This couldn't be it. Where the fuck were all the puzzles?

“What the _fuck_?! There’s no puzzles! All of these are either pictures or models! I was told there would be puzzles to solve!”

“nope. who told you that?”

“Well, uh… nobody…”

“BUT IT WAS STRONGLY FUCKING IMPLIED!” I bellowed.

“no, it wasn’t.”

This was horseshit.

“This is horseshit,” I announced.

Sans nudged me. “shh. papyrus is starting.”

Sans pointed over at Papyrus, preparing to address the crowd gathered in front of him. He cleared his throat.

“I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, FAMOUS ROYAL GUARDSMAN, UNPARALLELED SPAGHETTORE, ESTEEMED ARCHITECT…”

And then, I started spacing out. I think I managed to catch the words “KIDS LOVE DEADLY SPIKES,” but everything aside from that is a blur. I didn’t mean any disrespect to Papyrus, I’m just physically incapable of choosing what I pay attention to. One time I got hit by a car because I couldn’t take my eyes off a Mylar balloon caught in a tree on the other side of the street. Apparently, shiny objects can distract me enough to ignore self-preservation. Not that I had any sense of self-preservation in the first place.

_Papyrus. This is. ABOUT. PAPYRUS._

_FOCUS._

“…OF COURSE, MOST PEOPLE KNOW TO SIMPLY KEEP TO ONE WALL OF THE MAZE AND, EVENTUALLY, THEY’LL FIND THE EXIT.”

“SO, TO COMBAT THIS, I ELECTED TO ELECTRIFY IT!!!"

_Why the hell would you electrify an invisible maze? Touch is the only way you could navigate it._

_Wait, no, there’s probably wires underground like one of those invisible dog fences. Shit, I guess if magic exists, you could probably make some kind of invisible wall. Then electrify it._

_I mean, shocking people who go in would_ technically _make a maze harder to solve, but that feels like… cheating, I guess. It’s not harder because it’s complex, it’s just generally unpleasant. Then again, shocking people seems to be Papyrus's go-to solution for increasing difficulty. Maybe it's a kink?_

_....Nah, couldn't be. Papyrus is too pure._

_I guess if you’ve got rubber gloves or something, you can still do the whole “touch the wall” thing. Can you even get around that?_

_…Okay, if you make a big circle around the outside, anyone who sticks to the far wall will end up right back at the start, but that doesn’t really lead anywhere, then. It’s not a maze, it’s a ring._

_Unless you put stairs at the center._

_Okay, ring around the outside. How do you keep people out of the center? If the path leading in loops back around, you could shoot them back to the outside. But that’s just a loop again._

_I need a piece of paper._

_Shit. I don't think there's anything to keep people from brute-forcing their way through a maze. Maybe if you had a set time to solve it? Like, if a minotaur or some shit chased you, or your brother was being turned into a goblin. Or if you poisoned them and put the antidote at the end._

_How the hell would you work out how much poison to use, though? You can’t just give them a standard dosage, because then you’d have a little dude with high metabolism keeled over right by the entrance and a fucking giant lumbering their way to the end with time to spare. I mean, you can figure out how much everyone weighs, but you’d have no fucking clue how fast they’re going to absorb the poison._

_The Minotaur seems like a more viable option, but he’d be patrolling a random path, and when he finds you, you’re dead. That’s not really a time limit. Maybe make the ceiling drop, Indiana Jones-style? Or have flamethrowers pop out of the walls after a set time period. Or- HOLY SHIT PAPYRUS IS BEING ATTACKED._

_…Wait, did they just fucking suplex him?_

I ran up to the mystery attacker, ready to defend Papyrus. Why the fuck wasn't Sans doing anything? He must've run off to go get security or something, since he's about four feet tall and the fucking behemoth wrestling with Papyrus was, what, six, seven feet tall? Six-foot-six, head and shoulders? Guess it was up to me. Why the _fuck_ was it up to me? Why wasn't anyone doing anything?!

“GET THE SHITTING _FUCK_ OFF HIM!” I screamed, throwing a punch at the small of his attacker’s back that bounced off with a soft, delicate _pap!_

_Shit._

_Okay, you can do this. Get into a fighting stance: left foot forward, hands up, elbows down. Pivot on your right foot, turn your waist, and…_

The last thing I remember after that is a blue blur, followed by what I was pretty sure was a brick hitting the side of my head.

Then, nothing.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Artist's rendering of a nervous Will: http://imgur.com/a/AfA23


	6. [CGQK AV GTJ YSKRR ZNK VGOT]

Pain.

Pain pain pain pain pain pain.

Pain as my body atomizes, pain as my mind is fragmented, pain as my soul is ripped apart and scattered to the far corners of existence.

And then, gone. Nothing. Where am I?

…Who am I?

My thoughts are foggy and incoherent, scattered away and swept into the cracks in reality. What was I doing? Something very important. Death. Death seems to play a prominent part in my thoughts. Is it because I’m dead? Is this death?

I grasp at the trace of a memory. Something about a child? A child, yes.

I was a child.

No, wait. I _had_ a child. Two children.

Three children?

My memory is still full of holes, but my mind is coalescing as more parts of me are drawn into… _Something._

Whatever it is, it’s beautiful. Like a spotlight, making everything within it crisp and bright while the outside remains dark. Just being in it, I feel more solid, more alive. Able to scream into the darkness that I _am_.

My thoughts are clearer, now.

 _Think._ The child. What about the child is important? The child. Danger. Urgency. The child is in danger. The child is the danger.

...Well, I'll remember. I just have to wait here, where I can pull _just_ enough of myself together, and I'll remember.

I just need to wait.

And wait.

And _wait._

…

Ah. There you are.

I remember, now.

_Com̮̼e j̷̉̇̓oiṉ̢̣̪̳ t̝̘̹h̷͍͕e̴̲͇̥̳͙̣̮ f̛͓̹̳̟̩̳̚u҉̦̗n̸̮̖͚͂͌͆.̺͚̯̪͇̠̃̒̍ͮͬ̂͠_


	7. The Fin-al Pam? Chilean Sea Badass? Freshwater Mightfish?

I woke up to the bara-cuda who’d knocked me out standing over me, and Papyrus slamming his fists into my chest.

“Papyrus, what the fu _uhhmmm_!” My complaint was cut short as Papyrus closed his jaws around my face and exhaled loudly.

“HUUUUUH!”

_Is he… Is he humming “Stayin’ Alive?”_

"…cross between a goblin and a sock puppet coming at me," said the fish monster, " I’m gonna fight ba- Papyrus, you’re not supposed to do that anymore! Just use chest compression!”

I groaned as Papyrus brought his fists down on my chest again.

“You’re going too slow! Here, let me do it,” Brick Fishhouse said as she pushed past Papyrus.

“ _Nonononono_ I’m fine! I’m fine!!!” I pulled myself to my feet.

I took a few steps. “See? Fine.”

“OH. OH! GOOD!”

I rubbed the side of my head. “How long was I out?”

The bufferfish shrugged. “A couple seconds? You kind of grunted when Papyrus tried slapping you awake.”

“Okay,” I groaned. “Couple seconds. I _think_ that’s good.”

“No, it’s not,” she said.

“HOW MANY FINGERS AM I HOLDING UP?” Papyrus asked.

“Five.”

“NO, I WAS HOLDING UP SIX! SEE?” He wiggled his left hand, showing off his outstretched index finger.

“Your right hand was in front of me. I don’t have double vision, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“WHERE ARE WE?”

“Ebott Institute of Arts. Sucks, aside from the antiquities and one painting of a viperfish. I'm pretty sure you’re supposed to check for anterograde amnesia after a concussion, not retrograde…“

Shit. What was his name again?

“…Dude.”

“ARE YOU CONFUSED?” asked the tall skeleton.

I frowned. “Like, more so than usual?”

“I think that’s a ‘no,’ Papyrus” said the... uh... ripped-jack tuna?

“IS THERE ANY WEAKNESS IN YOUR LIMBS?”

“He means more than usual,” she clarified.

“…No.”

“ARE YOU TIRED?”

“Always.”

“HERE, CATCH!”

Papyrus tossed his keys at me. I juggled them in the air for several seconds, dropped them, and briefly played hacky-sack with them before kicking them up into my own face.

“OH MY GOD, HE HAS A BRAIN INJURY!”

“I’m always like this.”

Papyrus frowned. “OH.”

“…DO YOU REMEMBER WHAT HAPPENED?”

“You were talking about electrifying a minotaur, then she– “ I pointed to the fillet of swole at his side “–suplexed you and I thought you were being attacked– “

“I WAS! WITH AFFECTION!”

“–I tried to intervene and got punched in the head.”

Papyrus looked me over one last time. “…I THINK HE’S OKAY,” he announced.

“Wait, so you two… know each other?”

“YES.”

“So that was a _friendly_ suplex?”

“YES. DON’T YOU RECOGNIZE THE FLATTERY SUPLEX?”

“No. What’s the difference between a flattery suplex and a regular one?”

“YOU USE THE FLATTERY SUPLEX ON SOMEONE YOU’RE FLATTERING!”

Papyrus turned to the fish monster. “UNDYNE, THIS IS MY NEW FRIEND, UH…”

“BILL!”

“Will,” I corrected him as I held my hand out.

“RIGHT. PHIL, THIS IS MY FRIEND, UNDYNE!”

“Wait, like the explosives dudes?”

“Hey. Uh… Sorry for knocking you out,” Undyne said, applying five thousand pounds of force to my hand and shaking it.

“ _Eeeeeeeeiiii_ it’s fine. I mean, I did punch you in the back of the head. Twice.”

“Once.” She cleared her throat. “Soooooooo… Uh… Okay, weird question: why do you smell like Alaska?”

“Canada,” I corrected.

“CANADA!” Papyrus echoed.

Undyne leaned in and took a deep whiff of my pervasive boreal essence. “Yup! That’s definitely Canada. Why do you smell like Canada?”

“Body wash and lip balm.”

“Oh, neat," she said. "Cool scar, by the way."

I winced. “Thanks. I like your… uh…”

Where did I start? Not the eyepatch. Definitely not the eyepatch. Maybe the casual punky biker aesthetic she had going? The fact that she looked like she could suplex a train? Maybe the eye shadow. Wait, was that eye shadow, or some kind of marking? It _did_ match her fin… hair… hairfin. Thing.

“…arms? You are like… _scary_ buff.”

I am not good at compliments.

“Do you punch mountains for a living or something?”

“I’m a gym teacher.”

_Those poor kids._

"Well, studying to be one," she admitted.

I rubbed my head again. Holy _shit_ , that was sore. “That explains the whole ‘you hitting me, me hitting the floor’ thing.”

Undyne slapped me on the back in what was either a show of friendship or an attempt to break my spine. “Hey, if that’d been a real fight, you would’ve… Uh…” She trailed off, rubbing the back of her neck.

“…Well, sometimes the best thing to do in a fight is run away. _Sometimes._ ”

“good stance, though,” Sans noted.

“What?” I asked.

“…nothing. never mind.”

"Actually, yeah, that was a pretty good fighting stance," Undyne said. "You kind of ruined it right before you went for the right cross, though. Wait..."

She furrowed her brow and turned to Sans. "How'd you know?"

Sans shrugged. “i… watch a lot of anime.”

“ _REALLY?!?!?!_ ”

Undyne dashed over to Sans and grabbed him, holding him up to eye level as she flashed a grin like a bear trap.

“Oh my god, you have to come to anime night with us. Holy shit! Why didn’t you tell me this earlier???”

“…could you put me down, please?”

“What do you watch?”

“ _bee movie._ ”

The manic grin slid off Undyne's face. “What?”

“ _bee movie_ is my favorite anime.”

“ _Antz_ ,” I suggested.

“right, that too.”

“ _Legend of the Titanic."  
_

“STOP GIVING HIM IDEAS! HE’S ANNOYING ENOUGH AS IT IS.”

“ _Romeo and Juliet: Sealed with a Kiss._ ”

Undyne dropped Sans.

“Godammit, Sans.”

“… _The Mangler._ ”

“PHIL, I SHOULD WARN YOU THAT UNDYNE ENJOYS CARTOONS MADE FOR SMALL CHILDREN.”

“Papyrus, we’ve been _over this_ ,” Undyne roared, “anime’s not just for kids!”

Ha. No. _Nooooo_. Something like, say, _Psycho-Pass_ was _not_ for small children. Or _Paranoia Agent._ I like _Paranoia Agent._ I like shows that give you all the weird little pieces as the series progresses, but you don't realize what they are, put them together, and go "HOLY SHIT, I GET IT!" until the very end.

“I once watched a man brutally murder someone in the middle of a crowd of horrified onlookers."

“It’s DEEP!!!”

“The guy who kept the cops from catching him liked to slice people up with a razor.”

“It’s COMPLEX! It’s CHALLENGING!”

“He cut a dude’s eyes out with it.”

“It’s VIOLENT AND AWESOME!”

“Personality and methods aside, I’m like… fifty percent sure he was supposed to be the good guy. Sixty-five."

Undyne trailed off and turned to me. “Oh, uh… did you say something, Phil?”

I grinned at Undyne.

" _Gah!_ "

Why did people keep _doing_ that when I grinned at them? I'd _practiced_ , godammit. I'd _practiced_ not looking like the person I was smiling at was tasing me.

“You say that like modern children’s cartoons aren’t awesome. Like… cartoons and Smirnoff are my definition of an ideal Saturday night. Usually I’ll stop halfway through when I’m drunk enough and decide I want to listen to My Chem-… uh, my... King Crimson albums. I got them from a friend. _What music I don't listen to music ha ha what are you talking about?"_

Undyne raised what was either one or both eyebrows. “...So what do you watch?”

I shrugged. “I liked _Mushishi_. And _Princess Mononoke._ ”

“of course you did," Sans said.

Undyne nodded. “That’s the first thing me and Alphys watched on the surface. Nice!”

 “… _Dennou Coil,_ no fucking question, _Zankyou no Terror_ , _Death Parade_ , uh… one other thing. Fuck, lemme think. This is all from anime club back when I was in college. It's, like... been a while."

"Huh. What’s your degree in?”

“Oh. _Oh!_ _Guardian of the Sacred Spirit._ That’s what I forgot.”

For some reason, I felt like Undyne would like _Guardian of the Sacred Spirit._ I don't know; it was just a general _vibe_ I got from her.

“What’s that one about?”

_Better not give her a detailed description. She's not going to care about the detailed fantasy ecosystem, or the backstory of Balsa the unstoppable spear-wielding warrior woman. Just give her the basics._

I shrugged. “Eh, it’s about a warrior who’s sworn to protect this kid who’s carrying the egg of a water spirit that reproduces, like, once every thousand years. Kind of hard to remember.

“Huh. Sounds okay.”

“Did I mention _Dennou Coil_ yet? Because I love _Dennou coil._ ”

“I think I heard Alphys talking about that.”

“Who’s Ralphie?”

“My girlfriend. She’s the one who got me into anime.”

I looked around the room. “So where’s she?”

“Oh, she, uh… didn’t come." Undyne frowned. "Crowds make her nervous.”

I nodded. I can identify a kindred spirit when I hear about them. “I can respect that.”

I turned to Sans. “Yo, _Manos: the Sans of Fate_!  Uh…”

I scanned the room again. No sign of Sans. Somehow, he'd managed to disappear in the five seconds I'd taken my eyes off him. 

“…The fuck’d Sans go?”

Undyne shrugged. “He always just kind of… disappears.”

“ESPECIALLY WHEN THERE’S WORK TO BE DONE!” Papyrus added.

"Wanna go check out the antiquities?" Undyne asked. "They have swords!"

Christ. I couldn't just run off, could I? Make it clear that Papyrus was the only reason I was here, and now that he was done I wanted to _get the hell out?_

"Hey, let's hang out!"

"I'd love to, but right now I need to go, because I'd much rather be anywhere but here!"

"Okay, I'm sure that has nothing to do with me! You seem perfectly well-adjusted and not like a colossal dick at all! See you later!"

Yeah. That'd go over swimmingly.

_Okay, come up with an excuse. An excuse.... Excuse... What's a good excuse?  
_

"Sure."

_Fuck._

. . .

I liked Undyne. Undyne was fun. Something about her seemed... earnest, I guess? Her heart on her sleeve, or something like that. Sort of like a buffer, scalier version of myself who didn’t have anxiety. Or depression. Or weak arches. And wasn't socially awkward. And knew how to function.

So, basically, nothing like me in any way, but the sort of person I wished I could be. The sort of person who could suplex a boulder or some shit.

Despite myself, I started... _talking_ to her. We walked. We talked. My feet hurt. We agreed that dishwashers are a scam, because they wash dishes, but for _some fucking reason_ you can’t put dish soap in them and have to use specialized shit instead. Apparently Undyne had made that mistake five times since moving into a house with a dishwasher. And lit her kitchen on fire six times. In return, I told her about every hotel bathroom I’d ever used (I broke a shelf off the wall by gently tapping it, managed to rip the spout out of the bathtub, broke the plug the one time it wasn’t made of rubber, tripped on the shower curtain and pulled the rod down twice, somehow made a mirror fall by looking at it, shorted out the television, filled the bathtub with rice in an attempt to fix the television, clogged the bathtub drain with rice, realized I had to check out, and checked out of the hotel leaving behind a clogged bathtub full of wet rice and a television after hastily trying to write _SORRY :(_ in the surface of the rice.) My feet hurt. We found out that both of us are banned from the zoo: Me for releasing a bunch of monkeys, and her for hollering at the animals.

As it turns out, the museum didn't have any ugly Renaissance babies. Or benches. We looked at the rest of the folk art, because at that point, you might as well just walk around looking at non-ugly baby art like some kind of philistine. My feet were still sore from yesterday, and the fact that my shoes had fuck-all in terms of arch support wasn’t doing me any favors. I wanted to sit down, and the museum didn’t have _any. Fucking. Benches._ Their folk art collection did, however, have a set of antique furniture behind rope, including a very well-made hickory chair with a _PLEASE DON’T TOUCH_ sign placed neatly on its seat.

This chair mocked me.

“ _Fuuuuuuck_ ,” I whispered. “ _Yooooouuuuuu_.”

 “We should leave,” Undyne said from behind me. “Now.”

Fuck, did she hear me talking to the chair?

“Yeah. See if we can find a bench or some shit. My feet are _fucked._ ”

“No, I mean we should run. Ragel’s coming.”

“Who?”

“One of the reasons I never went to the Temmie village.”

"...What?"

“You hear that squeaking noise?” she asked, referring to the metallic squeaking noise slowly heading this way. “That’s the squeak of doom. We should get out of here before he starts dancing at us.”

“What do you mean ‘dancing at-?‘”

“Mushroom dance, mushroom dance, whatever could it mean?” came a voice from behind us.

“Oh, godammit,” Undyne sighed.

“…It signifies my unbridled rage that the museum still hasn’t accepted any of my work.” Said the potted mushroom. How did that work? I thought hyphae usually extended for- _NO!_ No. Wasn't gonna think about monster physiology. I was taking what I knew about non-magical life, and applying it to monsters, and that was _driving me crazy._

Undyne took a deep breath. “Will, this is Ragel.”

“Hi. I’m Bob” said the dogcat pulling the wagon around in a deep monotone.

“I see you’re enjoying the antiques."

I shrugged. “I guess it’s alright? I mean, it looks pretty, sure, but by attempting to preserve the piece, they’ve robbed it of its purpose and thus irrevocably altered its meaning.”

“What?”

“I mean, can you really call _this_ -” I gestured at the chair “-a ‘chair’ if you can’t sit in it? You can’t. You can’t sit in it, therefore it is no longer a chair. Instead, it’s become, like..."

I frowned and leaned forward to examine the chair. "...Fuck if I know. An accidental statement on the value of outwards appearances over competence, or a... shrine to materialism, or something. It isn't exemplary of any culture or time period or artist or anything in particular, and it isn't _that_ nice a chair, but they've somehow decided that it has value as something that happens to have descriptors like 'antique,' and to preserve those, they've _taken away the chair_. It's like... did someone put a lot of effort into making it? Yes. Should that effort be appreciated? Yes. What was that effort put into? _Making a chair._ _This is not a chair. There's artistry to be respected here, and it isn't being respected. They've altered its context, and therefore altered its meaning._ And the worst part is that _it isn't even useless enough to be a statement."_

"As furniture, it sucks,” I finished, “but as unintentional anti-art, it’s _almost_ brilliant.”

Ragel clasped his hands together. “...It needs work, but I see your point. Look, the way everything else is laid out serves to strengthen the piece’s meaning and… uh…”

“Counterpoint the surrealism of the underlying metaphor of the arranger’s compassionate soul?” I suggested.

“...Why not?"

Ragel stroked his chin. “…I need to think about this. Onwards, Bob!” He resumed dancing and rolled off.

“ _What,"_ Undyne hissed. _"The fuck. Was_ _that?_ ”

“Idunno. I think I was complaining about this chair being behind a rope?”

“That was COMPLAINING?!”

“Spite and pettiness are the driving forces of my life. If I didn't like you, and you told me I was gonna die someday, I'd probably live forever.”

“Wow. That was, uh, pretty impressive.”

“I just want to sit down.”

“...I pulled all of that out of my ass,” I clarified, “which would preferably be sitting on something right now. Fuck it, let’s just keep walking until we find someplace to sit down. What were we talking about before… _that_?”

“What you’re doing now that the zoo’s fired you.”

I shrugged. “Looking for work. I actually just applied to a bakery this morning.”

 “Wait, the one on Vesper Avenue? Spider Donuts?

"Yup."

“You applied there???”

“Yeah.”

“And they’re hiring… non-spider people?”

“Yeah," I said. “Apparently they needed someone big enough to work the register.”

She nodded. “Makes sense. It’d take, like, three spiders to work the register otherwise.”

“You’re, like, the second person to act all surprised when I say I applied there. It’s the purple recluse thing, right?”

“I gueeeeess…?”

Undyne frowned. “Okay, so, uh… A lot of people don’t really _like_ spiders?”

I bristled. Just because you don't like something doesn't mean you shouldn't respect its ecological role. “Yes, this is called arachnophobia. It’s distinguishable from most other phobias by the urge to actively hunt down spiders instead of screaming and running away like with an _actual fucking phobia_. Sort of like how my coulrophobia gives me an overwhelming desire to kill clowns. Birthdays, circuses, street performers, I’m like a Terminator for clowns, dude. I’ve tried to explaining to the kids that I have a legitimate psychological condition that is definitely not culturally acquired and drives me to kill shit that isn’t bothering anyone, but they just kept crying and going ‘waaah, waaah, you ruined my birthday, waaah.’”

“No," said Undyne, "I mean… Okay, first there’s the extortion, but after we left old Home, they kind of… set up in one corner of Hotland and, uh, ate anyone who wandered into their webs.”

_Oh._

“Patrols near their tunnels used to go missing, and then one day this guy came out covered in webs. I mean _completely_ wrapped up. He somehow got out by hopping around blindly. It was actually kind of hilarious to watch. Until he collapsed, anyway."

I nodded. “Mmm. What about humans?”

“Dunno. There weren’t that many humans in the Underground.”

“I am willing to take that chance.”

“Because A: I like spiders, and B: I crave the sweet release of death.” I explained.

“Aw, come on, don’t say that. I already have one depressed nerd to deal with.”

“I’m kidding, I’m kidding,” I lied. “I do like spiders, though. Did you know the bite of the Braz-?“

“Be careful, is all I’m saying.”

“Honestly, I doubt I’m gonna get hired anyway. So, uh... what'd you do before you... came up here?"

"Captain of the Royal Guard," she said proudly.

“The whuh?”

“Royal Guard. It was my job back in the Underground.”

I had no idea what that was.

"...You have no idea what that is, do you?"

“...No. They, uh, guard royalty, right?"

“I don’t think the royal family ever actually needed protecting. From other people, anyway. The palace did have a little bit of a theft problem… wait, it might’ve been trespassing in a restricted area. Some kind of suspicious behavior, I know that. Usually, she’d just hiss at us from the ceiling until someone shooed her out with a broom.”

"Huh."

I leaned against the base of a statue.

“Hey, are you sure you haven’t seen a bench anywhere? Seriously, my fee- _fuck_!”

I lurched backwards as the pedestal gave way, sending the statue crashing to the ground and shattering into several pieces.

“ _Ohhhhh. Fuck._ ”

“Wow, that is, uh… a lot lighter than it looks. That was, uh... Supposed to be bolted down or something. Right?”

“I think the stand is for display, or something.”

“I… am probably going to have to pay for this.”

Wow, that looked expensive. I slowly reached into my pocket, scrounged around for any loose change, and placed it on the pedestal.

“I must go.”

“Yes,” Undyne agreed, speedwalking away.

“Walk slower,” I hissed. “You look like you’re running away. We weren’t caught on camera-“

“ _You_ weren’t caught on camera.”

“-so when the next one sees us, the two people who were alone in the room with the broken statue, we need to act _natural._ ”

“I am.”

“No, you’re not. You’re too stiff. Loosen up, and don’t head straight away. Look at the art, maybe take a detour, or some shit.”

“I think we should leave.”

“...Yes," I agreed. “You are… surprisingly cool with this for a cop.”

”Royal Guard.”

“You’re surprisingly cool with this for a Royal Guard.”

Undyne shrugged. “Accidental property damage happens. Trust me, I'd know.”

“Huh.”

“You should probably make sure you don’t lean on anything else, though.”

“Well, yeah, now that I know nothing’s bolted down.”

_Wait, that means you could steal something by the viperfish guy if you wanted to._

_…Naaaahhhh._

Undyne walked up to the front desk.

“Hey, someone broke one of the statues.”

 _God_ dammit _, Undyne. Okay, change the subject change the subject CHANGE THE SUBJECT._

“See, I just walked into this room, and I saw-“

I ran over, bringing myself between her and the clerk. “Hey, sorry, uh, sorry about uh, earlier.”

“I have no idea who you are.”

“I’m the asshole who couldn’t find his wallet.”

“Dude, I just got here. I woke up… I dunno, maybe an hour ago?”

“…Oh. Uh, sorry.”

“…Really need to reset my alarm.”

“Sorry, I don’t usually notice cashiers. Fuck. Remember cashiers. _Fuck!_ Sorry. I respect the work you do, and you as a person, but I don’t really remember someone I’m probably only gonna see once. Sorry. _Fuck_ , that came out wrong. Fuck. I’m not an asshole. I mean, I am, but I try not to be. Sorry. Fuck.”

I took a deep breath.

“You should use your phone. That way it keeps going if the power gets knocked out. Sorry.”

“I guess? Kind of ruins the point of having an alarm clock.”

I shrugged. “Fair enough.”

“So what’d you do, sneak in?”

“What? No, n-“

“Because if it makes you feel any better, someone bought a ticket with counterfeit cash the other day.”

“Who the fuck counterfeits a ten dollar b- _Oh my god_ that is brilliant. Who the fuck checks a ten dollar bill?”

“One dollar. We still have one; look.”

The cashier held up a piece of what looked suspiciously like construction paper that someone had drawn on with a ball-point pen.

“…The banner under the portrait says 'Wasington, _'_ ” I observed. “...and the top says _SPIDER BUCKS: REAL MONEY!_ ”

“It was almost the end of my shift; I was _tired_ , okay?!”

 “…Okay. You, uh, you have a good one.”

I went back to Undyne.

“Hey, Undyne?”

“Yeah?”

“For future reference: Never be the person reporting it. Everyone’ll assume you’re… covering your tracks, or some shit.”

“…Okay, I’m kind of starting to see what Sans meant. You have… a _lot_ of experience not getting caught. Or, uh, blamed.”

“Wait, what do you mean ‘see what Sans meant?’”

“Wait, did someone _teach you that?_ ” Undyne asked, smoothly and subtly changing the subject.

"What? No, it's just... what I've noticed. Over time. So much goddamn time."

" _So many fucking times,_ " I sighed. "Sorry about… making you an accomplice, I guess.”

Undyne shrugged. “Eh. I needed an excuse to get out of here, anyway. I. _hate_. puzzles. I'm just here because Papyrus likes them."

"...Okay."

"...Did I ever tell you about the time I went 'fuck it' and bulldozed through a puzzle in New Home?"

"N-... Wait, is that how you got community service?"

"Yeah. An entire month of pushing blocks around an office. _An entire. Month."_

"Yeah, that's, uh..."

Undyne's eye began to twitch. _"_ I had _dreams_ about it. I kept having this... _nightmare_ where there's like a hundred marked floor tiles, and every time I push something I wind up in a corner, and MORE BLOCKS KEEP COMING IN AND I..."

_Twitch. Twitch._

"...I don't wanna talk about," she growled. "Look, I hate puzzles, okay? Corporate life _drained_ my respect for them."

"...Okay, then."

She stared out at the parking lot. “Wait, did Papyrus drive you here?”

“Yeah. It was, uh… energizing?”

“Did he do that thing where he flips into the driver’s seat?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, fuck," she said, stepping over the orange cat from earlier as he lay hyperventilating on the ground. "I can't just leave you here. Need a ride?”

“Yeah,” I answered, eager to avoid another ride with Papyrus. “Yes, _please_. Can you swing by the Bakery? I think I left my wallet there.”

Undyne shrugged again as we set off for the pickup truck on the other side of the lot. “Sure. Why not?”

This was nice. I’d spent all day worrying about how I’d have to get back on Mr. Bones’ Wild Ride, and here I was being given a ride that _wouldn’t_ make me fear for my life.

Today was a good day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I LIIIIIIIIVE!
> 
> ...I'm high as kite on cold medicine right now, and I'm not quite sure what planet I'm on. If anyone sees a mistake I made editing this, please let me know.


	8. I am an Will

“NGAHHHH!!!” Undyne screamed as crested the hill and shot into the air.

“AAAAAAAGH!” I agreed as we crashed back down to earth.

We screamed. I screamed, Undyne screamed, the radio screamed.

“... _Runnin' in the Nineties! Is a new way to set me free! I'm just runnin' in the Nineties! Yes I wanna knoooow, yes I-"  
_

“Undyne," I screamed, "you passed the bakery! _You passed the bakery!”_

“Oh, shit, really?”

“ _Yes!_ ”

Undyne yanked on the parking brake, and the truck screamed around in the other direction. Honestly, I was surprised she didn’t just start driving backwards.

“I didn’t know you could make a bootlegger’s turn with a truck,” I squealed.

“Yeah, this thing's awesome! You wouldn’t _believe_ how much shit you can fit in the back. Alphys loves it! We go down to the du-”

“I bet it’s really safe, too. Lots of uh, crumple zones, and shit.”

“I dunno. Honestly, a lot of it’s rusted.”

“Of course.”

“It holds up when I bench-press it, at least.”

“That’s… that’s great.”

Undyne drifted into a parking space. I stumbled out, fought back the urge to vomit, and pulled out my lighter.

“I, I n-need a cigarette,” I stammered.

“You realize that every one of those takes a day off your life, right?”

“Yeah," I said, lighting the cigarette. "I’m trying to build up a tolerance until I can smoke three hundred and sixty-four of ‘em at once.” I leaned against the truck and looked at the bakery.

_SPIDER DONUTS – Café and pâtisserie -  NOW HIRING._

_Wait, did something blue just dart through that alley? It almost looked like…_

_Naaaahhh._

I jumped at the sudden shrill, piercing sound of...

 _Wait, was that a fucking_ steam whistle? _Who the fuck still uses a fucking steam whistle?_

_...Fuck it. It was probably the brakes on, like... a bus, or something._

I went back to leaning against the truck. Steam whistle. Who the fuck would be using a steam whistle? Do people even use those anymore?

Fuckin' steam whistles.

“Sans said Frisk goes in here all the time,” I said.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, so I don't quite know what the deal is with spiders, but, like… you just let your kid go in here?”

Undyne frowned. “…what do you mean ‘my kid?’”

“Frisk goes in there all the time, right?”

“Wait, you think I’m _Frisk’s MOM?!_ ”

“Well, yeah.”

“ _Why the hell would you think I’m Frisk’s mom?!_ ”

“…I haven't really been paying attention to the news. They just kinda keep accumulating parents, right?”

“…no.”

“…Oh. So you let your non-kid go in there?”

“Well, yeah. I mean…”

Undyne sighed. “Look, from what I know, the relationship between spiders and the rest of the Underground was… um… _complicated._ ”

"Giant cave spiders are a vital part of any underground community," I said.

“They pretty much kept to themselves and didn’t mess with anyone as long as you didn’t mess with them. Things are… different now that we’re on the surface. Better.”

I snorted.

“ _Wow_ , y-… uh. Yeah. I guess.”

“You still don’t want to piss them off, though. Spider venom paralyzes you while it’s draining your HOPE.”

“Right, like the dude in the cotton candy c’coon who c’llapsed.”

“What? No, it was just silk.”

“Yeah, I know. I was referencing… uh… never mind. That’s cool. Neurotoxins are cool.”

“Well,” Undyne said, “it’s… not really a neurotoxin. It’s a purple atta-... wait, did you just say ‘neurotoxins are cool?’”

“Well, yeah. They are. Did you know the bite of the Brazilian wandering spider causes priapism?”

“…I didn’t.”

“Named after-“

“So, it's a purple attack. Like, if, I don't know, green attacks focus on healing or creating shields, purple magic is all about shutting people down. Or it’s slippery and makes you smell like lemons. I don’t really know anymore. I think I’m spending too much time around Papyrus.”

“Huh.” I crushed my cigarette under my foot. “Neat.”

“...Alright, I'ma go get my wallet," I said, walking off and slamming face-first into the door.

“You’re supposed to pull it!”

“ _Thank you,_ Undyne _,_ ” I growled.

I pushed on the door.

_Wait. Fuck._

I pulled the door open.

_Wait, would admitting I lost my wallet, with my money, ID, and pretty much everything else in it, hurt my chance at a job? I feel like that would make me look less competent, or something.  
_

“…hair looks like he stuck his finger in a light socket.“

_Oh, shit, and I'm walking up to a counter without buying anything. I always feel awkward doing that.  
_

“ _Hnhhh_ … He’s going to ask if she’s read his pile of shame. He’s persistent, I’ll give him that.”

_Okay: Job prospects. Increase them.  
_

“No, he’s not. Look at him, Scapegrace. He forgot why he came here the second he walked through the door.”

_Maybe try, like... fuck if I know. Maybe I'm overthinking this.  
_

“You mean _into_ the door.”

_Okay, so how much do I even need a wallet?_

“He always looks like that!" The little spider from earlier croaked. "You saw him earlier, right?”

“Uh, Boris?”

“He _always_ walks like he’s trying to figure out if he's lost or not."

“Boris!”

“I look at him walk, I swear I can hear… tubas, or something.”

“Boris!”

I waved to the group of spiders. “Hey, uh… dudes. I’m, uh… back. Uh… salutations?”

The small spider turned around.

“Shit. I _knew_ I smelled Canada," he rasped in that deep, pack-of-cigarettes-an-hour voice that shouldn’t have been possible for something about the size of my thumb. Like an eight-legged Tom Waits.

“ _For fuck’s sake_ ,” I snapped, “my only other options for fragrances are shit with names like ' _GLACIAL CRUSH_ _!,_ or ' _ALPINE EXPLOSION_ ,' or ' _NO SNOWMO_!' The fuck does 'glacial crush' even smell like? Like… dirt, and… old water. Powdered rock, probably. Maybe some of those wingless scorpionflies or some shit.”

“Wingless what?”

“I don’t wanna smell like that. Well, most of that. No, wait, they’d probably try to mate with me and my body heat’d kill them. I don’t wanna smell like any of that.”

“…I have _no clue_ what you’re saying.”

“Honestly, most of the time I don’t either.”

I knelt down and held out my hand. “I’m Will. My brain makes word-sounds that come out of my mouth, with no filter in between.”

The spider climbed onto my hand. Then my arm. He kept climbing until he reached my head.

“Uh…”

Seven fuzzy little limbs smacked into my face.

“Ow! Jesus!”

“THE FUCK DID I SAY LAST TIME?!” he yelled into my ear.

“Oh, uh… right. Don’t bend down. Shit. Fuck. Sorry. _Shit!_ I’m an asshole.”

“I know.”

“…can you get off of me, please?”

The spider dropped off my face. I stood up.

“I think we got off on the wrong foot, here. Specifically yours. Hello. I am an assho-… I am an Will.”

“I’m Boris,” the spider growled.

“…Boris the spider?” I asked.

"Yeah.... What? What's wrong with my name?"

"...Nothing. Again, can’t state enough how excited I am to work here. Y’know, if I get hired.”

“How’re you gonna work here if you can’t get in?”

“You _do_ realize there’s a sign on the door, don’t you?”

“I am not the most observant person," I admitted.

“You look like you’re observing everything at all times, and it _terrifies_ you,” one of the spiders noted.

“That’s… Okay, yeah, basically. The problem is that I can never figure out _what_ to focus on.”

“You look like one of those lemurs the really long fingers,” Boris said.

I pointed a thin, creepy finger at him.

“Okay, _first off_ , you’re thinking of an aye-aye. Second… Okay, look, I wanna be mad, but… Wow. Christ. That is… _really_ fucking accurate, dude.”

I looked at my reflection in the window. _Jesus_ , I couldn’t un-see it. I looked like a fucking aye-aye.

“…did I leave my wallet here?”

“Uh…”

“N-… Nyes?” Boris said, cautiously.

“…should I ask the cashier?”

“Nefinitely.”

“…Oookaaay, then.” I shuffled awkwardly up to the counter.

“That’s all he had? Really?! Now I almost feel… _bad_ about this.”

“Should we give it ba-?”

“I said _almost_.”

I waved to the cashier. “He-h-h, uh… Salutations!”

She looked up at me with the same expression she’d had when I’d turned in my resume.

“Salutations, dearie.”

“Hi. Sorry. I am an Will. Did I leave my wallet here?”

She didn't say anything. She just kept staring at me. Frozen. I could swear I was getting, like, a deer in the headlights vibe from her.

"...Like, my first thought was that it'd fallen out, but my pockets deep as shi-, really deep-" I stuck my hand in my pocket to demonstrate "-and it isn't in the car, and, uh, this is the last place I remember using it. Did I leave it on the counter with my, you know, my resume?"

“N-, uh, I mean…” She cleared her throat. “Well, someone _did_ turn a wallet in this morning. Quick, what color was it?”

“Black. My ID’s still in there, right?

The cashier opened up my wallet. “Oh. Yes, it is. _Well._ There’s no mistaking who this belongs to.”

“He looks like a lemur,” said the spider on her shoulder. “Or a goblin.”

“Charlotte! That’s incredibly…”

“Um…”

“…Accurate.”

“I look like an aye-aye!” I said brightly.

She frowned and squinted at the card.

"...Your name is _Wilip?_ "

"...That's a typo."

The cashier crossed her arms.

"Typo," I repeated.

"So, your first name is..."

"...Will. Is. Son. Bur. Wilsonbur. Wilburson. _I have no name._ Except Will... Son. Wilson."

"Wilson."

I nodded. “Yes. That is an me. Uh, that is a me.”

“That me,” I said quietly.

She shrugged and handed my wallet to me. I tugged on it, trying to extract it from her vice-like grip. I could _swear_ she was staring me down or something.

“…You can let go, now.”

With a small hissing noise, she finally let go. I looked inside my wallet. “Was there like five bucks in here?”

“Not when it was turned in~”

 “Oh.”

 I turned to the display case. I’d come all the way here, might as well buy something. It wasn’t like _everything_ was horrendously overpriced, right?

“…Out of curiosity, what’s in the spider donut?”

“Spiders,” the cashier said bluntly.

" _You don't want it!_ " Shoulder-spider said.

“…Right. Should’ve been obvious.”

I pursed my lips.

“…Okay, this is gonna sound dumb, but what’s in the chocolate chip cookie?”

“Chocolate.”

“And Chip,” shoulder-spider added.

The cashier’s expression turned solemn. “Poor Chip.”

“…What about the chocolate croissant?” I asked.

" _You don't want it!"_

“Flour, sugar, butter, milk, salt, yeast, eggs, butter, chocolate, and more butter. What else would be in it?”

_"You do not want to use your card in here!"  
_

“Y’know,” I said, backing away from the counter, “I’m right about to go get something to eat, so I will come back… laterrrr.”

_Finger guns, finger guns, walking backwards, leaving now._

“You, uh, you have a good one.”

“You too, dearie~”

I turned and pulled on the door. It didn’t budge.

“You are _really_ bad with doors,” Boris rasped from somewhere above my head.

“There’s a _handle_ , okay? If you put a handle for pulling on a door you’re supposed to push, people get confused!”

“Some people, maybe.”

I pushed on the door and stormed out.

“So, how’d it go?” Undyne asked.

“I got my wallet back. And apparently I look like an aye-aye. Do I look like an aye-aye?”

“What the fuck is an aye-aye?” Undyne asked.

I took my phone out and googled it.

“This,” I said as I handed my phone to her.

“What? No, you don’t…”

Undyne squinted at the phone, then looked at me. Then at the phone. Then back at me. Then back at the phone.

Then at me.

Then at the phone.

“…Oh my god. What the fuck?”

She looked me over. “…you’re sure you’re human, right? Because there are a lot of monsters that look like surface animals, and, uh… Okay, look, I’m looking at this thing, and looking at you, and I can’t un-see it.”

“I’m like seventy percent sure I’m human,” I said. “There may be some goblin in there somewhere, but I’m not an aye-aye. I know that. I’ve only eaten, like, one grub in my entire life.”

“…Are you sure? Where’s your family from?”

“Most of them landed near a farm in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. I think.”

“Wait, you’re from Kentucky? I thought you were from Brooklyn.”

“No, it’s, uh… Like... Hopkinsville. Space goblins. Goblins from space. That turn out to be great horned owls."

"...What?"

“Y’know, I’m just gonna stop talking now. The longer my mouth is open, the greater the chance I’m gonna say something fucked up. Like… alien encounters or conspiracy theories or unsolved murders or some shit like that.”

“Wait, aliens? That… actually sounds kinda cool.”

“…I guess? "

I glanced back at the bakery.

"...Heeeyyy, so, uhhh... Can I ask, uh, a quick question?"

"What?" Undyne asked.

"So, like... what exactly was the _deal_ with spiders and the rest of the Undergrou-"

Undyne turned the radio on.

 _“UNCLE CLUCKO’S DISCOUNT CHICKEN HOLE!”_ The radio blared.

_“COME IN TODAY AND TRY OUR NEW INFINITE CHICKEN BUCKET! HOW MUCH CHICKEN CAN YOU FIT IN YOUR MOUTH AT ONCE? FIND OUT FOR THE LOW, LOW PRICE OF TWELVE NINETY-NINE!_

_“FOR AN EXTRA FOUR NINETY-NINE, WE’LL FEED IT TO YOU! WE’LL BRING IT TO THE TABLE AND PUT IT! IN! YOUR MOUTH!”_

_“WE’LL FORCE-FEED YOOOOOUUUUU!!!”_

_...Okay, then._

"Oooo- _kaaaay_ , never mind, then."

"What?"

"Never mind!"

Undyne changed the channel.

_“I swear, he was right there on the corner a second ago!"_

"Look," I said, "it’s been an awkward day. Y’wanna go get a drink or something?"

I cleared my throat.

“By that,” I clarified, “I mean ‘I need a drink.’ Just drop me off at a liquor store somewhere.”

“You been to Grillby’s?”

“Once, yeah. Got a side order of fries.”

“Oh my god, you _have_ to try the cheese fries. They’re _AMAZINGLY_ BAD FOR YOU!” Undyne punched the roof of the truck, denting it.

_No. No. You are not buying cheese fries. You are going to apologize profusely and tell Undyne that, unfortunately, you have to be somewhere else, and you will go home and make a fried egg or something. DO NOT. BUY. THE CHEESE FRIES._

“What’s on ‘em?”

“…Cheese.”

“No, I mean like, do they put… ground beef or anything on ‘em?”

“If you ask for 'em, yeah! You can get grilled onions,  jalapenos, chili... ooh, you've gotta try the burnt crunchy bits! They're AWESOME!”

“That… sounds fucking incredible."

_Goooooood. Now apologize, tell her you have a job interview in ten minutes, and hope she doesn’t offer to drive you there. In under ten minutes._

“Let’s fuckin’ do it.”

_STOP SPENDING MONEY! STOP SPENDING MONEY! STOP SPENDING MONEY! STOP SPENDING MONEY, YOU STUPID LITTLE GOBLIN-MAN. STOP IT. NO. NO!_

"Hey, how much you wanna bet I can make it in under ten minutes?"

"Ten mi-... Undyne, wait!"

"WAIT!" I screamed as she slammed down on the gas pedal. The tires screamed as we took off down the street. _Everything screamed._

Shit.

 


	9. Gins and Gins and Gins and Gins and...

Undyne was staring at me.

She had stopped eating, set her cheese fries down, and was currently watching me intently, mouth open, aghast.

I don’t know what went wrong. I’d been telling Undyne that I should probably just go home and cook something, and then she’d told me about the time she set her kitchen on fire making a salad while I had some gin, and _of course_ I’d brought up spontaneous human combustion, which naturally led to me comparing the wick effect to the formation of adipocere while I drank more gin. That had led to a discussion about the differences between human and monster death, and I had some gin, then I had more gin and somehow managed to turn that into an impromptu alcohol-fueled lecture about bizarre medical conditions, which I was trying to make loud enough to be heard over the noise of the bar.

Oh, wait, that was the problem. _I had happened._

…In my defense, the only fire-related conversation topics I could think of were spontaneous human combustion and “fun with stump remover,” and at the time, I had _no_ idea how Undyne would react to that. Badly, probably.

I did not know Undyne that well.

“Basically,” I slurred, “one identical twin absorbs the other, and because the absorbed twin gets its blood supply from its twin instead of the placenta, it’s nutrient-deprived and never develops beyond this squishy little brainless parasite.”

There was a screeching noise as everyone at the bar scooted their stools farther away. Could Undyne hear me over that? Probably not. I couldn’t hear myself over that. I needed to talk _louder._

“At least, I _think_ they’re brainless. Usually. There was this case in Kazakhstan where they picked one up during a routine examination because it had enough of a nervous system for the doctor to notice it _moving_. Like, reflexively, not consciously. Lazarus sign. But, like, sometimes they have faces, eyes, and functioning hands. Like that dude who had a fully-developed foot removed from his brain. So a brain isn’t, you know, _impossible._ ”

This was a mistake. Why did I come here? I should’ve gotten out of the truck near a liquor store, then gone home. I like drinking alone. It’s one of my favorite hobbies.

“Man,” Undyne said. “Humans. Are. The. _Freakiest. Shit._ ”

“Yyyep.”

I glanced down at my empty glass.

“I appear to be out of gin.”

I like gin. It's cheap, tastes good, and clear liquors give you less of a hangover.

“Hey, sorry, can I get some more gin?” I called. “Thanks. Gins and gins and gins. Many gins. Please. Stop when my blood smells like juniper. I’m aiming for around a one-percent BAC. Anything above point-five, really. More gin, please. Thanks.”

“And another lime!” Undyne added. Did you know she eats whole limes? She doesn’t even peel them. It’s _disgusting._

I slapped my hand on the bar. “Ooh, ooh, speaking of parasites, ever heard of a botfly?! They’re these flies that ensure their larvae have a warm, sheltered environment and a constant supply of fresh food by– “

"IT'S A CAKE!" Papyrus bellowed as he entered the bar. "IT'S BAKED LAYERS OF STARCH WITH A FILLING."

"it's not a cake," said Sans. "i'm pretty sure cakes have to taste like... fruit, or chocolate, or something."

"TOMATOES OR A FRUIT!"

"Culinarily, they're a vegetable!" I called.

"SO ARE CARROTS," Papyrus replied as Undyne dashed over to him.

"Hey, Papyrus!"

“HELLO, UNDYNE!”

“Wanna hear something gross?"

“…PLEASE DON’T."

" _Too late!_

"NO! SANS, TELL UNDYNE TO STOP SAYING GROSS THINGS."

"undyne, stop saying gross things."

"No."

"okay."

"SAAAAANS..."

"Oh, I've also got this I've got this idea for a puzzle!" Undyne said excitedly. "Okay, so you've got these steam vents-"

"LET'S GO BACK TO THE FIRST THING."

Undyne snorted and bit into her lime.

“hey.”

I pointed a pair of finger guns at Sans. “Hey, hey, hey, Sanzee Makara!”

“what?”

 _…Wait. Oh. Oh,_ shit _. SHIT._

“…Sansby’s plaquera," I said, hoping Sans would never look up any of this. "It’s a species of fish that feeds by eating the parasites off other, larger fish. You know, a symbiotic relationship, like a wrasse or an oxpecker or something.”

_NOBODY CAN NEVER KNOW._

“What’re you guys doing here?” I asked, quickly changing the subject.

“THE MUSEUM CLOSES AT FIVE!”

“Fi–… _sheeeee-iiiiiiiit_ ,” I groaned. “What time is it?”

Sans shrugged. “idunno. four? four-ish?”

“Thank you, uh… uh…”

“small papyrus.”

I snapped my fingers and pointed at Small Papyrus.

“ _Mystery Sa-ans Thea-terrrr, Three-Thooouuuu-saaaaaaand!_ ”

“ _Three-thou-Sans,_ ” I muttered as I slumped over the bar. “Shit.”

Mystery Sans Theater Three-thou-Sans cocked an… eye… bone… brow-thing. What’s the word for that? Orbit? No, wait, that’s the part your eye fits inside, not the ridge on top.

“do you spend your free time coming up with nicknames for me?”

“Nah,” I mumbled into my empty glass. “I’m pulling all of these out of my ass. You have an easily modifiable name, Sanzibar.”

I straightened up again, turning to face Sanzibar. “See? Sans Francisco, Gordon Sans-ay, The Cat with Sans, Sans-tasm, Sans-tasm Two, Sans-tasm Three: Lord of the Dead, uh…”

“Neon Genesis E-Sans-elion,” Undyne suggested.

 “ _Yeeesss_. The Sans Guardian, Guardian of the Sans…“

“na-sans ro-sans.”

“… _I-Sans-bul, not Con-Sans-inople,_ ” I warbled, _“now it’s I-Sans-bul, not Con-Sans-inople, If you’ve a date, in Con-Sans-inople, she’ll be waiting in I-Sans-bul! Even ooold New Yooork, was once New Sans-terdam_ – _”_

“SANS-TER-SANS.”

“– _Why’d they change it, who Sans say? People just liked it better that waaay!_ ”

_…Did I just start singing? Christ. I just started singing._

_Hey, wait! I’m drunk!_

“…I’m drunk,” I slurred.

“…i can see that,” I-Sans-bul-Not-Con-Sans-inople said.

Grillby brought me more gin. I slid my empty glass across the bar-top.

I cleared my throat. “…So, uh… yeah. Your name fits in a lot of, uh, shit.”

“…okay then.” Sans glanced down at my drink. “…what is that?”

“Neat gin.”

“…huh.”

“What?”

“nothing.”

Just like that, my guts were tying themselves into knots. Back tensing up, shoulders pulling inwards.  What the _fuck_ was wrong with gin? What was I doing wrong this time? It was almost five on a Saturday. I could drink, right? What was wrong with neat gin?

“What’s wrong with gin? It’s cheap, high-proof, and I like how it tastes. People drink it straight, right? What’s wrong with gin?”

“uh, nothing. it’s just a little, uh… it’s not what i’d order, I guess.”

“...Oh. Okay, uh... why wouldn’t you order it?”

“it’s a little strong for me, is all.”

_Liar. You can’t just act like I’m doing something wrong, then pretend it never happened. What am I doing, this time? TELL ME WHAT I’M DOING WRONG, SANS._

“…Oooo- _kay_ , then.”

Was I glaring at Sans? I hoped I wasn’t glaring at sans. I don’t even know if I _can_ glare. I tried to make sure I wasn’t glaring at Sans as I got up from my seat. “ _Annnyway_ , Undyne, Papyrus… Naked Florida Sans Robs Convenience Store with Rocket Launcher, if Grillby comes by, can you tell him I’m coming back and didn’t, like… skip out on the check? I’m gonna go, uh, smoke." I began wobbling towards the door, then flinched as Papyrus put a hand on my shoulder.

“PHIL, ARE YOU AWARE THAT SMOKING CAUSES LUNG CANCER?”

 “Yep.”

“…OH. YOU DO?”

“Yes.”

“…PHIL, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WHILE UNDERSTANDING PERFECTLY, WISHES TO KNOW IF YOU KNOW WHAT A ‘CANCER’ IS.”

“Ooh, Alphys told me about that!” Undyne said. “It’s when part of a human’s body gets a mind of its own and starts absorbing everything around it. I think. So, yeah, Will. You shouldn’t smoke.”

“Look,” I sighed, “I know, I know, I know. I don’t smoke near other people, and I put my butts in an appropriate receptacle when one’s available. It's not affecting anyone else, and it’s the only thing that…”

I trailed off as the significance of this gap in everyone’s knowledge hit me like, I don’t know, a low-speed sedan or a big scaly blue fist or something.

“Wait. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Wait. Do monsters get cancer?”

“Nope.”

“nah.”

“WHAT’S A CANCER?”

_No. No way in hell…_

“Quick, what’s DNA?” I asked.

“UHHHHH…”

“Something… really important… to who… you… are?”

“it’s like some kinda second soul, right?”

“…huh."

I took my phone out and opened up a memo.

_No and?_

Wait. Fuck. Fucking autocorrect.

_No Dan?_

…Fuck.

_No Dan and Tucker fucker dna dna dna fucker_

_Find med lit_

“…Are you writing this down?” Undyne asked.

“No,” I said, deleting the memo. “Just checking my texts.”

“Anyway, I’ma go smoke. Be right back.”

I turned and stumbled out of the bar. Behind me, I could vaguely make out Undyne saying something about “timing the pukes.” Whatever the fuck _that_ meant.

_They don’t have DNA._

_What the fuuuuuuck?_

Ignoring the obvious, and probably over-simplified, explanation of “magic,” monster anatomy was the _weirdest fucking thing_ I’d ever seen. First I was pretty sure that I’d seen the Square-Cube Law curled up in the fetal position in one corner of that bakery, sobbing quietly. Then I’d ended up groping the back of Papyrus’s head and getting mouth-to-mouth from him, and my theory that every part of his body was invisible except for his bones went to shit. Oh, and I was being served drinks by a dude who was _literally made of fucking fire._

I was pleasantly confused and kind of pissed off (is there a word for that? Fcurious? Irritrigued?) that everything I knew about biology was wrong, but at the same time, I didn’t want to just come out and say “I want to learn about monster physiology.” Something about it felt… is “invasive” the right word? Maybe "condescending." Treating them like they were under a microscope. Like a bug or a microbe or something.

No, wait.

 _…Dehumanizing!_ Yeah. That’s it.

Wait. Fuck.

…I felt like at best, it would come off as desapientizing, and at worst, it’d be like going up to someone and going “YOU HAVE LOVELY SKIN! HOW MUCH BLOOD’S IN YOU?” Either way, I'd probably sound weird as hell.

I don’t know. Maybe I was overthinking this. I didn’t want to just _ignore_ the feeling I was getting. If I felt like I was doing something wrong, _I was probably doing something wrong._ Besides, this wasn’t _that_ interesting. They were still following the laws of physics and not, like, _floating in mid-air_ or anything. At least everything was… connected, I guess?

“Excuse me.”

“Sorry.”

 I stepped aside _as fucking Rayman_ floated out of the bar wearing a wizard costume and drifted down the sidewalk with his knee-less, detached feet floating along underneath him.

_Huh._

_Okay then._

I flicked my lighter, swore, faced the wall to keep out the wind, flicked it again, swore again, beat it against the palm of my hand, swore, beat my lighter against the side of the bar, flicked it, lit my cigarette, then turned my attention to a couple guys having a conversation across the street.

_Wait, did that guy just point at you? Nah, looks like he’s pointing at the bar. Ooh, wait, shiny! What is that? Lost jewelry? Circuitry? Cool rock? Neat beetle?  
_

_No, looks like part of a broken streetlamp. False alarm._

_I really need to start wearing cargo pants again. So many pockets. Why did I stop wearing cargo pants? Oh, right. I looked like a tool._

The pair looked over at me, and I turned my attention to my phone. I didn’t want to look like I was eavesdropping. Plus, the internet was _right there_ , waiting to tell me how the _fuck_ monsters worked.

I needed the internet. The internet probably had answers. Somewhere. Somewhere very, very far away, beyond a vast fucking sea of urban legends, unfounded bullshit made to suit an agenda, and screaming bags of veiny, wiggling cocks, eagerly spreading the aforementioned bullshit on a medium where "talk shit, get hit" didn't apply because it justified their wiggly cock-baggery.

There were answers somewhere in there, though. Somewhere. Probably.

I bet they were behind a paywall.

Googling _skeleton anatomy_ just got me a bunch of pages on the human skeleton, and one link for a chiropractor.

 _Monster skeleton anatomy got_ me several guides to drawing.

 _Monster anatomy_ got me more guides, and porn. So much goddamn porn.

 _Monster anatomy ebott_ also got me porn, and a discussion of the whole, you know, monster situation. I ignored it. No answers there. Just anger. I could practically hear the pulsing, wiggly noises coming from it.

Eventually, a search for _monster anatomy ebott -art -drawing -render -fetish_ _-porn -nsfw_ got me the knowledge that Monster.com had been bought by a dude in Amsterdam, and _exactly one_ excerpt from an old book on magic.

_While monsters are mostly made of magic, human beings are mostly made of water._

_Humans, with their physical forms, are far stronger than us._

_But they will never know the joy of expressing themselves through magic._

_They’ll never get a bullet-pattern birthday card..._

That was it? That was everything?

That… couldn’t be right, could it? Didn’t Undyne say she got heat stroke one time? No, wait, that wasn’t just dehydration, that was when heat starts interfering with the enzymes that carry out cellular processes…

Cellular processes. Cells. With DNA.

…Fuck it, monsters had to have some kind of chemical reaction going on in their bodies. Undyne breathed, so oxygen was probably playing a part, there. And she needed at least _some_ water.

_Okay. Start with what you know.  Monsters eat. Monsters take in nutrients. Magic must be playing some role in the metabolic process. Does it replace water? It can’t replace water completely, monsters still need to drink._

_Wait, what about Grillby?_

_…Fuck._

_Okay. Magic. Magic, magic, magic. It all starts with magic. What do you know about magic? It’s not just shitting pixie dust on things and altering reality as you please, it has to have_ rules. _What do I know about magic?_

_The barrier. A physical barrier. Magic is solid. Magic exerts force. Didn’t Undyne say magic comes from the soul, or something like that?_

_Wait, souls are real. Those contracts are real! They’re actually legally binding! I’m pretty sure they are, anyway. I hope they are. I got witnesses and everything. Okay, monsters are made of magic. The soul, which you can hopefully transfer ownership of, produces magic. A monster’s soul disappears when they die. Monsters also disintegrate when they die. Monsters eat, which means they take in at least some mundane matter._

_Monsters are made of physical matter held together by magic, which is produced by the soul. When the soul becomes too weak, the magic disappears. Sounds about right._

_What’s up with the soul, though? Is it like, a_ soul _soul? Is it just a magical organ? What would the benefits of having someone else’s soul be, aside from selling it? Double the magic? Wait, can I do magic? Sure, I could do magic. The barrier, remember? How many souls would I need for that? I need to make sure those contracts are HOT LIPS HOT MOUTH HOT THROAT HOT!_

I coughed and spat out the burned-down cigarette butt. Jesus, was I finished already? For a second, I considered staying outside, then realized I still had to pay my bill. I headed back in and immediately ran into that lumpy-looking onion dude.

I didn’t like Onion Man. He had that thing going on with his face where you automatically want to slap him upside the head when you see it. Something about his expression made him look like he was going to tag along with you uninvited, then _complain_ constantly, or go “don’t I get a hug, too?” or become the emissary of a world-destroying alien or some shit. Plus, he smelled like onions for some reason.

At least, I hoped it was onions.

“Excuse me,’” I mumbled.

Oh, and he did shit like stand right in the middle of the shortest path back to the bar. There was also that.

“…wasn’t healing me! I’m the DPS, I _need to be alive_. You don’t just go over to the other side of the map where everyone– “

“Sorry, can I squeeze past you here?”

Onion Man turned and glared at me. At least, I think he was glaring at me. It was kind of hard to read, since he always managed to look smug and whiny at the same time, but I think I saw irritation in there, somewhere.

“Uh, we’re in the middle of a _conversation?_ ”

I was pretty sure conversations usually had more than one person talking. And the other person had to be paying attention. And you _didn’t have them in the middle of the path through a crowded bar, Onion Man._

Fucking _Onion Man._

“…sorry,” I mumbled, turning and working my way around the edge of the bar.

Bars. I fucking hate bars. You know what’s cheaper than a bar? The liquor store. You don’t have to pay a pouring fee at a liquor store. Or get stuck behind a giant woodland animal, a mythological creature, and… I don’t know, a hairy, bisected scorpion wearing a cheap wig, or something.

 “Sorry, ‘scuse me,” I said, shimmying past a giant rabbit.

“Oh my _gooood_! I love your shirt!”

“…Thanks.”

“Can I have it?”

“No, I, uh… need this. Sorry. How drunk are you?”

“Yeah!”

“…Okay, then.”

I kept moving.

“Sorry. Sorry. Excuse me. Sorry.”

 _What’s New Pussycat?_ began to blare from the jukebox. I turned and saw Sans walking back to his seat.

_Of course._

I stopped and waited for Audrey II to pass.

“Sorry.”

“ _WHAT’S NEW, PUSSYCAT? WOAH-OH-WOOOAAAH-WOAH!_ ”

_Clink._

I took a deep breath. Another. Long, deep breaths. _Calm._ I was calm. I was _collected._ _I was not at a FUCKING LOUD, crowded bar._

 “…and I was all…”

 “ _Pussycat, pussycat, I’ve got flowers, and lots, of hours to speeend with you!_ ”

I circled around… a duck? I didn’t even know anymore.

“Sorry.”

“…and he was like…”

_Clink._

“ _So, go and powwwder your cute little pussycat nooose!”_

Ducked past, I don’t know, an oni. Big, red, tusks, horns. Sure. An Oni. If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a mountain-dwelling hell-guardian from Japanese folklore.

“…just ignore it, and you don’t _tell anyone_ …”

_Clink._

“ _Pussycat, pussycat, IIIII looove-“_

_Clink. Screech!_

 “…so I’m standing there, no pants, salsa on my…”

“Sorry.”

_Is that dude looking at me? What am I doing? Is it how I walk? Probably. I walk like something made in a mad scientist’s lab. Shit. Okay, fluid. Jaunty. No, that looks worse. Fuck. Okay, maybe if I–_

“Sorry, sorry, sorry. Excuse me.”

_–Walked like that guy? No, wait, he doesn’t have any legs. Shit._

“…still waiting in line for…”

_Okay, just… keep doing what you’re doing. Wait, you’re drunk! Walk like you’re drunk! Perfect! No, wait, fuck. Stop that. No, that’s worse. Now you’re moving like sasquatch. Stiffer, like NO WAIT THAT’S A GOOSE STEP DON’T DO THAT. Okay, what if–_

Undyne tapped me on the shoulder.

“Hey, wanna see something cool?”

“…Ooo-kaaaaay?” I answered, hesitantly.

She turned to a group of dogs seated at one table.

“LOOK AT THAT DOG!” she shouted.

What’s-His-Face, the dog with the tank top (Dogger? I think his name was Dogger) got out of his seat and snapped to attention.

“LOOK AT THAT DOG!”

Dogger got down on all fours, tail wagging.

“LOOK AT THAT DOOOOOG!”

I watched as Dogger shifted into maximum over-wiggle.

“ _Who’s a good boy?_ ”

“I AM,” Dogger barked. “I AM THE GOOD BOY.”

“ _You aaarrre!”_

“FUCK YEAAAAAAAAHHH!” he screamed, barreling through a table and flopping to the ground at our feet.

“Hey! Its, uh, Dogger, right?” I asked, flashing a big, non-threatening grin.

Dogger recoiled, ears flat, then slowly, _slowly_ backed away. He turned and bolted out of the bar.

“What’d I do?” I asked, turning to Undyne.

“HOLY _FUCK!_ ” She screamed, jumping back, knocking over a bar stool in the process. “Uh. Uhhhh… maybe you should just… uh… _stop_ pretending to smile?”

“This _is_ my real smile,” I growled, gritting my teeth.

“No, that’s the smile you make when you’re taking a picture next to someone you hate, and they keep having to re-take the photo.”

“But I’m smiling with my eyes!” I said, as my eyes burned with murderous rage.

“Will, that’s not smiling with your eyes, that’s _telegraphing your attack!_ ”

“What if I did it like _this?_ ”

“…Try relaxing your face a little,” Undyne suggested.

“I’m drunk. This is as relaxed as I can get.”

I wasn’t relaxed. Bars. Fucking _bars._ You know what’s better than a bar? Drinking at home. Less money, less stress, and people don’t run away screaming when I smile at them.

“What if I did this?” I asked with a grimace.

“…No. Now your mouth is lopsided. And one eyebrow’s higher than the other. You look like if a Dreamworks character wanted to turn me into a lampshade. Just… go back to your old one.”

“Uhkay.”

“NO, NO, NONONONONO!” she screamed. “NOT THAT ONE! NOT THAT ONE! NO! THE OTHER ONE!”

“Yuh mean thiff one?” I snarled, baring my pointy little rat-teeth.

“…Yeah. Sure, let’s go with that,” she said nervously.

“ _Muh fafe huwts_.”

“…You can stop smiling, now. Please.”

“UNDYNE, WHAT’S…?”

Papyrus froze, staring at me in mute horror.

“ _Uh’m fmiling!_ ” I said brightly.

“…OH. THAT’S… A VERY… NICE SMILE,” Papyrus said nervously. “IT’S… CHARM…IIIING?”

“…Please stop smiling,” Undyne begged.

“YOU SHOULD STOP,” Papyrus agreed.

“I should stop.” I said as we sat back down at the bar.

 “Out of curiosity,” I asked, gin in hand, “how’d you kn–, what made you think I was pretending to smile?”

“It changes every time you do it,” Undyne said.

“Well, yeah, because my natural smile makes small children cry. I have to _practice_ that shit.”

“…Really?”

“Yeah. Step one, separate your lips. Step two, use facial muscles to pull back the corners of your mouth. Step three, widen your eyes. Believe in a smiling God. Strex.”

“…What?”

“Nothing.”

I downed my drink.

“…Anyway, I’m gonna go. I’ve got work tomorrow and shit, so I’d better get going.”

Wait. Shit. I told both Undyne and Papyrus I was looking for work, didn’t I? And tomorrow was Sunday. _Fuck._

“By which I mean, you know, I’ve got shit I gotta get done. I’m gonna go.”

Undyne frowned. “Oh. What’re you doing?”

_Fuuuck._

Okay.

I needed a lie. Like, a real lie. One that holds up to scrutiny. Not an “I’m the only one who can verify this” lie, or a “you’ll never remember all the details of this, and the ones you can will turn up something real if you look them up,” lie. An _actual, effort-requiring lie._ Something detailed enough to be convincing, but not so detailed that it _sounded_ like I was trying to convince you. Just enough to sound boring as hell. Details they couldn’t actually disprove. Maybe a couple gaps to fit in an “I can’t remember.”

“What’re you doing?” Undyne repeated.

Oh, and most importantly, _fast._

You know, the sort of lie that’d come from someone who wasn’t drunk, nervous, and bad at lying.

“…I can’t remember.”

“It’ll come to you,” Undyne said.

“Okay.”

I drummed my fingers on the bar. Could I look at my phone? I probably shouldn’t look at my phone.

_I should go._

I stared at Papyrus blankly. Then at Sans. Then Undyne.

I appeared to be out of conversation topics.

_GO. NOW._

Awkward silence.

Okay. Conversation topics. What were we talking about before this? Cancer. Fire. Gross shit.

…This was the wrong line of thinking for a conversation topic.

Puzzles. Riddles? Jokes.

Nothing.

_SMOKE BOMB! METSUBUSHI! POCKET-SAND! GO!_

I drummed my fingers on the bar.

…Monster anatomy? No, wait, I was trying to be as uninvasive as possible about that.

I glanced at Undyne’s eyepatch. Her good eye, her scales, her teeth, her hair-fin- _seriously-what-the-fuck was-that-thing?_

Then I looked over at Sans and his… bones. And his bones. And his more-bones.

Sans was not a good example for figuring out how the differentiation of cells or whatever the hell made up monsters worked. Hopefully I could get something useful out of asking Undyne about her eye. Growth, or regeneration, or how complicated structures worked, or something.

Wait, shit, I couldn’t just _ask_ her how she lost the eye, right? I mean, I guess she did say 'cool scar' when she met me, but... nah, an eye was different.

Okay, uninvasive. As polite as possible. No talking about monster anatomy. No asking Undyne about the eye. What else could I talk about?

“Hey, Undyne, how’d you lose the eye?” I blurted out.

_GOD. DAMN. IT._

Undyne grimaced. A long, pained breath hissed through her bared teeth.

_Shit. Shit shit shit shit shit. Godammit, why did I bring up the eye? Fuck. I’m an asshole._

_…SMOKE BOMB!_

“Aw, shit. Shit. Sorry, sorry, just- Oh, hey, before I forget, the DNA thing's confusing me. Monsters can get sick, right?"

"Oh, yeah, totally. Just off the top of my head, there's, uh... magic deficiency, falling down... uh..."

"This is also a common issue among our elderly," I said.

"DEPRESSION," Papyrus suggested.

"Oh, yeah. Depression..."

"Okay," I said, "so I was thinking more like 'flu' or-"

"Home syndrome," Undyne said.

I nodded. "Or Home syndrome, right."

I had no idea what Home Syndrome was.

“…You have no idea what Home Syndrome is, do you?”

“…No,” I admitted.

"Okay," she said. "That's fine. So-"

"Wait, what's Home syndrome?" I asked.

"Nothing." Undyne groaned. "Forget I..."

"Okay, _fine,_ " she sighed.

I held my hands up. "Listen, nev-"

“Home syndrome,” Undyne explained, “is when a kid’s magic develops normally, but for some reason, they can’t use it. It looks like they’re just getting their magic later, but they actually have... a mental block, or something like that. When it finally comes out, they can’t control it, and it hits _everything._ Magic comes from your soul, so it hurts them, that freaks them out, they lash out with magic on reflex, the magic hurts them, they lash out, and it just kind of keeps going until…"

"...You know.”

Wow. Dead kids. That was… that was a mood-killer.

Wait, shit. I just said “mood killer,” didn’t I? Fuck.

“WE USED TO HAVE THAT!” said Papyrus. "AT LEAST, I THINK WE DID."

“studying it gave us the magic version of judo,” Sans said, “so there’s… wait, what?”

 “DAD TRIED EVERYTHING TO FIX IT.”

“ _what?_ ” Sans repeated.

“REMEMBER?"

"...not really," Sans admitted. He scooted closer on his bar stool. “papyrus. tell. me. e _verything_.”

“WELL…”

Papyrus frowned. “…I DON’T REMEMBER.”

“really? you don’t remember _anything_ else? c’mon, there’s gotta be something, right?”

“UH…”

“IT’S FUZZY, BUT I REMEMBER…”

“UH…”

“UH…”

“I REMEMBER THAT…”

“I HAVE TO GO TO THE BATHROOM!”

Papyrus took a running start, leapt, and dove through the bar’s window.

The bar’s _closed_ window.

I silently stared at the broken window for several seconds until I was able to repair my train of thought enough to ask _what the shit just happened._

“Papyrus jumped through the window,” I observed.

“yeah,” Sans said, “he does that.”

Undyne clapped her hands. “Great landing, Papyrus!”

“THANK YOU!”

…Okay, then.

I was pretty sure this was getting awkward. Or going to get awkward. And expensive. How many drinks had I had? Five, right? No, wait, six.

“Hey, Grillby! Sorry, can I get a check, please? Thanks.”

_Wait, six drinks, average serving size… forty-five milliliters? Forty percent alcohol by volume… fuck it, Sans and Undyne are talking. Just go down to the liquor store. LIQUOR STORE. Then you can go home and reach the hangover threshold in peace. And cheaper. But mainly in peace._

Silently, Grillby set my check down and wandered off to serve someone else.

_Okay, fuck, how do I break this down? Twenty percent? Christ, this is why I hate bars. They’re loud, I don’t know anyone, and I have to tip. Don’t have to tip at the liquor store._

_Okay, twenty percent, round up to a dollar value… No, that feels too low. Let’s go with, ehhhhh…_

“Nine,” I muttered to myself as I slid the check back across the bar and pulled out my phone.

What the fuck did I look up? “ _Barrier ebott_ ” would just get me a bunch of news articles, “ _magic ebott_ ” would probably get me news and some magician’s website, and “ _monster magic_ ” would either get more news or some kind of high fantasy shit.

Wait, I had a book quote, right? Maybe I could find the entire page it was on. Or the entire book.

I Googled _“Bullet pattern birthday card”_ and got gun-themed birthday cards. Half of them appeared to be for pre-teens.

_Godammit. Okay, what about, uh…_

_Magic… instruction… -RPG -“video game”_

I got instructions for playing _Magic: The Gathering._

“Your card’s declined,” Grillby hissed. Or was that rasped?

...Snapped, crackled and popped?

“What?”

“It’s declined," he firenoised.

“…Can you run it again?”

Grillby ran it again.

“Still declined. Do you have another card?”

“Okay, sorry, I checked it yesterday, and I know for a _fact_ I have enough money to cover this. Can you put the number in manually?”

Grillby put the number in manually.

“It’s still declined.”

“Oh. _Huh._ Shit. Uhhh…”

 “Shit, shit, shit, look, this has literally never happened before, I have no fucking clue what I’m supposed to do, shit.”

“Okay," I stammered, "so, like I swear to God, I had money this morning, I lost my wallet, and someone turned it in, and, uh… Okay, fuck, I… shit. Sorry sorry sorry. Can I, like… wash dishes or something?”

I slid my phone across the bartop.

“Trade you my phone for it? I pay the tab, you give me phone back? What about my glasses?”

Grillby looked down at my phone and glasses, then looked back at me.

 “…You came in yesterday, right?”

“…Yeah?”

“And you’re friends with Sans?”

“I’d say I’m more friends with Papyrus, but, uh, we’re… acquainted, I guess?”

“You said you live over on Alma avenue, right?”

“Yeah? Do you wanna, like… mail me the bill? Is that a thing? Can you do that? I swear to fucking God, this has never happened before. It’s six eighty two, Alma avenue, apart–“

“I’ll keep your tab open. Pay it off the next time you come in.”

“Oh… uh… Okaaaay?”

I picked my phone up and held it out. Grillby just… kept staring at it.

“…It’s collateral,” I explained.

“Keep it.”

“How will you know I’m not just gonna run off, then?”

“You’re in walking distance and you hang out with Sans.”

“Okay, but-“

He held a finger up, cutting me off. “Look, I’m trying to throw you a b–…“

He stopped and looked at Sans.

“…Do you a favor.”

“Are you sure? I can give you my apartment number, and a couple thrift stores where you can buy a baseball bat cheap. Wait, no, you can just use a stick or a pipe or something. Give me a deadline, and if I don’t meet it, you can come over and break my kn–“

“ _No._ ”

“…I don’t understand.”

“ _I’m,_ ” Grillby said slowly. “ _Assuming. You. Will. Come. Back._ ”

“Probably,” he added. “You can pay it back then.”

_...Why?! How do you know I won't screw you over? There are lots of places I could drink. I've only known Papyrus for a day. For all you know, I could never come back here._

_WHY DO YOU TRUST ME?_

“…Wow, that’s… uh… thanks. Okay. Thank you. _Thank you thank you thank you._ ”

I kept staring at him for an uncomfortably long time.

“…I’m gonna go.”

“Okay.”

“I am leaving now.”

“Glasses.”

“Right,” I said, putting my glasses back on. “Oh, hey, unrelated note, are you hiring?”

Grillby remained silent.

I took another resume out of my pocket, uncrumpled it, unfolded it, and set it on the bartop, unsuccessfully attempting to smooth it out.

“It’s kinda… blurred, because of the rain, and it looks like a wrinkly shame-pile, but… uh…"

I looked up at Grillby. He remained silent.

"I’m gonna go.”

Grillby remained silent.

“I will see you… _laterrr_. Later.”

I backed away from the bar, pointing a pair of finger guns at Grillby.

“Phone,” Grillby said, not looking up from the drink he was pouring.

“Right, shit!”

I hurriedly put my phone back in my pocket. “Later, dude!”

Grillby didn’t look up.

“ _Later, dude!_ ” I repeated, louder this time.

…He probably heard me.

I backed away from the bar, still pointing, and ran straight into Onion Man, still blocking the most direct route from the bar to the door.

Fuckin’ _Onion Man._

“Hey, watch where you’re going!”

“Shit, sorry, sorry,” I lied, hurrying to the door.

I had an awful feeling that when Papyrus came back, he was going to want to drag me somewhere else. _Home._ I wanted to go home. I was exhausted, and I was pretty sure the noise from the bar was giving me a migraine. My eyes refused to focus, and I was vaguely aware of a dull ache somewhere around my left temple, coupled with a throbbing in time with my pulse that extended to the back of my head.

_Okay. Think. How many eggs do I have left? Eight, right? Six or eight. An even number. No, wait, it’s six. The carton’s half empty._

_Six eggs, half a pack of chips, and a block of cheese. I can go… what, a week? Yeah, I can space that out for a week._

_Wait, shit, when I get a job, when’ll my first paycheck come? Shit. Fuck. Godammit. Okay, I can… probably be a little behind on rent? When is rent due?_

_Wait, do I have anything else in the pantry? Shit, no, I don’t. Fuck, I should’ve bought cereal. One job. I need a job in one week. I’ll live. Get to sleep on time so I don’t get hungry, I can live on one cup of coffee, one egg, and one plate of nachos a day. I can skip lunch as long as I have HOLY FUCKING SHIT MY CIGARETTES SHIT SHIT FUCK GODAMMIT FUCK FUCKING GODAMMIT FUCK.  
_

_Okay. Don’t panic. I probably have spare change around the house._

_I’ll… Fuck, I’ll have to pay with pennies or something, won’t I? Jesus fucking Christ. They have machines that convert change into cash, right? Like, at the bank?  
_

_Wait, I’m pretty sure I have a fuckton of rice somewhere. Yeah. Bulk bag of rice with its own gravitational pull._

_I’ll live._

_Oh, hey, Papyrus is talking to those two dudes. And their friends. Alright, gonna try and sneak off to the corner, before he notices me._

_Wait._

_Wait, what did they just say? What’s going on?_

“Give me _one_ good reason not to shoot you, right now! Just one, c’mon! C’mon!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've got 37 drafts of this chapter saved on my computer. I still don't like it. In the meantime, let me just fit this plotpoint in very gently... very... gently. *whips out a hammer.* VERY GENTLY.
> 
> Edit: "Home Syndrome" came from trying to figure out how Karmic Retribution works. The easier it is to hurt someone, the easier it is to... trick you into getting past your DEF with your own ATK, or something. I don't know how I feel about it, now. What do you think? Yes? No?


	10. Livid

I had an answer to that. A really, really good answer.

…That I wasn’t going to give. Nope. No. The situation wouldn’t escalate unless I did it myself. All I had to do was stay calm, walk over, and call out something like “the fuck is going on, here? You fine young gentlemen aren’t doing anything that’d make someone want to put you through a wood chipper, right?” Just let them know someone was watching them, and they wouldn’t, like, panic. Or decide that with two people, they _miiiiight_ be able to play it off as self-defense, because we thought we could win a two-on-one fight. With a good lawyer, the right jury might actually believe that.

That probably wouldn’t happen, though. As long as nobody challenged the fucked-up fantasy universe revolving around this guy in his head, this was intimidation only. Make someone feel weak, powerless, feel superior to them, and get away with it, then stroke your power-boner and go “ha ha, we made someone suffer!”I mean, who shows off a gun, goes “give me one good reason not to shoot you?” then _actually_ shoots you? You know, aside from a sadistic meathead scumfuck fucking sack of fucking dogshit that gets off on knowing that he can do whatever he wants to you, and… that… probably wasn’t what I was looking at. I had _no_ idea what I was looking at. I _wasn’t_ intimately familiar with these people.

...I mean, even if someone is _pure fucking evil,_ _they at_ least they tried to hide it. Both to avoid getting found out, and avoid having to admit that fact to themselves. This could still be deescalated. Anger would only make the situation worse.

On the other hand, this guy already sounded like he was mid-tantrum, and the longer his train of thought continued down the same track, the greater the odds of him working himself up until he did something impulsive. Or, you know, “impulsive.” Also, the fact that this was already happening in broad daylight meant he was _really_ cocky. Like, more so than usual.

But, the situation was still at, like… a low simmer. Papyrus didn’t have a mean bone in his body. These guys _didn’t_ see that as a weakness. A refusal to fight back, no matter what they did. They _weren’t_ a bunch of amoral predatory fucks who saw refusing to hurt them as an excuse to do whatever they wanted.

…They were totally going to shoot Papyrus.

I had a momentary urge to fling them from wall to wall until they turned to red paste. Like I was strong enough to do that. I looked around for a bottle. A pipe. Something big and smashy. A morning star!

…A rock?

A brick.

Anything?

Was there any gravel around? If I took one of my socks off, I could fill… no, that was stupid. It’d take too long.

Okay. I was going to walk over and tap the guy on the shoulder, or something. Let him know someone was watching.

When he turned around and opened his mouth to respond, I was going to shove my wallet down his throat, choking him to death.

…That’d take a couple minutes, though. Enough time for him to shoot me.

God fucking dammit.

Okay, so maybe I had an answer to “give me one reason not to shoot you” that I _reaaaaally_ liked. Wait, not liked. No. It didn’t make me smile or anything like that. I just thought it was hard to argue with, cathartic, and… ironic? Like, situationally ironic. You know, like the punishments in Dante’s _Inferno_. You take some _fucking repulsive_ shitsmear with zero redeeming qualities whose life revolves around sadism and domination, then you take away a lot of power and control he has over his life. The kind of stuff he uses so often, he takes it for granted. In return, you give him a difficult life, an anger he can’t take out on other people, and a revenge fantasy he can’t live out. Every day, something would remind him of what happened, and he’d beat himself against the sides of his own rock-like troglodyte skull and go ‘How _dare_ someone treat me that way?! _I’ll show you!_ ’ before he realized ‘ _oh, wait, I can’t,’_ and his ego would deflate just a _little_ bit more.

…It was also horrible, and enjoying it would make me horrible, and I wouldn’t do it, even if it was… a _fraction_ of what he deserved.

I’d think of something, though.

Maybe I could just, like, break his fingers or something, so he couldn’t pull the trigger. I mean, grab the gun. His back was to me. I could jump on him before he got the gun out.

_Anything in their back pockets? Anything that looks like a weapon? No, but I see a lot of wallets. Why do people do that? You’re sitting on it all day, and someone can just come up behind you and take it. That’s why I always use the hip pocket. It’s deeper. Secure as fuck._

A plan was beginning to form in my mind. Maybe not a good one, but still a plan. I was completely bare-handed, outnumbered, and very, very weak. This was a bad idea.

…This would end badly anyway.

Fuck it.


	11. Local Goblin-Man is Afraid (Not of Anything in Particular, Just in General)

I want to take a second to say that I am by _no means_ fearless. I’m, like, the opposite of that. I’m fearful. Full of fears. Fear practically _leaks_ out of me. Trust me, it's gross. I have shitloads of fears. Here, I’ll list a few:

  1. A stroke. A brain aneurysm can strike at any time, and with my lifestyle, I'm pretty much a blood clot waiting to happen. I think. I'm pretty sure I have a vitamin K deficiency, so that might balance it out.
  2. A brain aneurysm that gives me locked-in syndrome. I'd spend the rest of my life only able to move my eyes, and keep trying to say “ _kill me_ ” in Morse code, but I don’t know Morse code so I’d be stuck as a prisoner in my own body.
  3. Getting locked-in syndrome, and everyone thinks I’m in a coma, then someone comes in and says “Quick! President Pope-Baby, the baby who is the pope and also a president, needs a new heart this second!” Then someone goes “this guy’s an organ donor! He’s not brain-dead yet, but he has no chance of waking up and we can probably fudge the rules a little for President Pope-Baby!” So they start CUTTING ME APART WHILE I’M STILL CONSCIOUS AND I CAN FEEL EVERYTHING BUT I HAVE LOCKED-IN SYNDROME SO I CAN’T TELL THEM I’M NOT IN A COMA JESUS CHRIST JESUS CHRIST JESUS CHRIST FUCK.



…I mean, I’d probably give up my heart for President Pope-Baby.  The closest an actual baby could get to greed would be wanting something so he could stick it in his mouth, and at his most malevolent, he'd just be cranky and need a nap. I feel like his policies would be morally just and generally beneficial, and if any of them weren’t, you could just jangle your keys in front of him and distract him. Or hide the bill so he thinks it doesn’t exist anymore. I’d die for President Pope-Baby, but I’d really like to have some say in the matter and not, you know, feel myself dying. Anyway,

  1. Pike. The fish, not the weapon. Did you hear about that kid from a couple years ago who was wading around barefoot and got his toes bitten off by a pike? Pike aren’t even supposed to be in water that shallow. Kid never saw it coming.
  2. Murky, potentially pike-hiding water.
  3. Deep water.
  4. The polar ice-caps melting enough that they can’t reflect enough sunlight to keep the earth’s temperature stable, turning global warming into a runaway process and flooding most coastal cities while crops wither and disease vectors swarm over the land.
  5. More adults who just _act_ like babies getting into a position with any real power.
  6. Cancer.
  7. A heart attack.
  8. I think my heart just stopped beating. HOLY SHIT I CAN’T FEEL MY HEARTBEAT. JESUS CH- no, wait, there it is. Never mind.
  9. I think my heart just stopped for several seconds, and it might happen again.
  10. Geese.
  11. Wasps.
  12. A fascinating species of giant, temperate-climate-dwelling parasitic wasp that’s going to paralyze me and lay eggs in my chest, which will then hatch and eat me alive, saving my vital organs for last.
  13. Flying.
  14. Getting hit by a car.
  15. Someone miles away firing a gun into the air, angled at anything other than 90 degrees, and the bullet travelling in a giant arc which I’m at the end of.
  16. Some guy going on a shooting spree right next to me. I’m the first person he notices.
  17. A serial bomber blowing up my apartment. Seriously, do you have any idea how easy it is to make high explosives? Any asshole could do it and put it in my apartment for no reason other than that they can.
  18. Serial killers. Same reason as the bomber. Even if they get caught, the cops won’t start looking for them until _after_ my apartment explodes or one of my eyes turns up in an abandoned warehouse. Oh, speaking of which...
  19. Cops. Any position with enough authority to abuse will inevitably get swarmed by people who want to abuse it. Especially when that position gives someone a gun, a badge, and preference when it’s your word against theirs.
  20. Crowds.
  21. People in general.
  22. Social isolation.
  23. Choking on something, not being able to self-Heimlich, and dying alone in my apartment.
  24. Someone injecting a powerful, undetectable poison into packaged food, sealing the syringe-hole, then me buying the food, eating it, and dying alone in horrible agony.
  25. The fact that anyone who wants to kill someone else could probably kill me before I knew what was going on, just because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
  26. The fact that anyone could kill me by accident, just because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and they were a dumbass.
  27. The fact that anyone could kill me by accident, just because I was in the wrong place at the wrong time and _I_ was a dumbass.
  28. Lyme disease.
  29. Dementia.
  30. Meningitis.
  31. Hepatitis.
  32. Drug-resistant necrotizing fasciitis.
  33. Cirrhosis.
  34. Vanishing bone disease.
  35. Ocular detonation.
  36. Hepatic detonation.
  37. Naegleria fowleri, the amoeba that eats brain cells.
  38. Space madness.
  39. Tripping, landing wrong, and snapping my neck.
  40. Getting wedged in a vent or cave tunnel or something where nobody can hear me scream.
  41. Someone being able to read my mind.
  42. That nothing about me is likeable, and everyone around me is humoring me because it's easier than any potential conflict they think calling me out might create.
  43. Someone actually _relying_ on me.
  44. Being a burden.
  45. Accidentally hurting someone.
  46. Death in general.
  47. Life in general.



...I could go on all day. Literally, all day. Never ask me "what could go wrong?" because I'll answer that question in _excruciating_ detail. What I’m saying is, fear _oozes_ out of me. I sweat nightmares and shit terror, and not in a badass way.

I am always afraid.


	12. Bruise-Purple

With shaking hands, I removed my glasses, folded them shut, and placed them in a doorway.

_I bet you think you’ve found an easy target, don’t you?_

Muscles tense. Head pounding. Jaw clenched. The entire world shrank down to a pinpoint. Just me, and them. If you cut me, I would’ve bled napalm.

 _Oh, hello again, Red Haze. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? What’s that? You think I should make these guys feel bad about what they’re doing? You know that’s impossib-… Ohhhhh, you literally want doing this to make them_ feel bad _. Good idea!_

I lunged at the man in the jacket. “Run!” I screamed, wrapping my arm around his neck. “Get around a corner, and _keep running!_ ”

“Jesus Christ, is that a fucking gremlin?!”

_This is why I need a smoke bomb. This entire alley could be filled with smoke right now._

Jacketguy lurched backwards.

 _No, no, no, I just tackled you, you’re supposed to fall_ forwards! FORWARDS!

We fell over backwards. I wheezed as Jacket landed on top of me, knocking the wind out of me. He sat up, still trying to pry my arm off, and turned his head to look at me. I responded by tilting my head back and slamming it into his temple. At least, I tried to slam. In retrospect, it was probably more of a firm tap. I began going through his pockets.

Someone was trying to pry me off. Who was trying to pry me off? I couldn’t let go. As long as I was holding this guy, he couldn’t grab the gun. As long as I was on his back, he couldn’t shoot me. 

_Wait. If he has his right arm under your armpit, and he’s wearing a T-shirt…_

I turned and sank my teeth into his upper arm. Hey, wait, biting! That worked with the plan! Better than the original plan, even. Fuck it, I could probably use Chewie here as a meat-shield. I let go of Jacket and grabbed onto Chewie's arm as I kept biting down.

Chewie drew his fist back and punched me in the nose.

“Guh! Fuhg! Ferrio-… Seriously? It takes you this long to think 'hit him until he lets–' _oh, godammit._ ”

I released Chewie and wiped my mouth on my shoulder, leaving a dark red stain, before delivering a vicious knee to the groin and turning back to…

Oh.

Jacket had the gun out. Pointed at my face. Right, that was why I'd been clinging to his back.

Shit.

_What are the odds he can put me down before I reach him? I mean kill me instantly? High. Probably high. That thing's pointed right at my head.  
_

_...Do it. See what happens. I'm barely using my frontal lobe, anyway, and if I survive this, I'm gonna be pissed._

“Gimme one reason not to shoot you,” he spat.

 _Oh, for_ fuck’s _sake…_

“Jesus Christ,” I sighed. “At least _mix it up._ Like, maybe start off with ‘I could shoot you right now, and you couldn’t do anything to stop m-‘”

“Now!” he barked, moving closer.

 _Yeah, sure, stomp, scream, stomp, snort. “YOU’D BETTER GIVE ME WHAT I WANT, RIGHT NOW, OR I’M_ REALLY _GONNA GET MAD!” I bet you use that a lot, don't you?_

 “One second,” I said, reaching into my pocket. “A last cigarette’s customary.”

“ _Now!_ ”

“Let me smoke or pull the trigger already."

“Come on,” someone said, “Just shoot h-“

“NOW!”

For a second, I thought I could still make out the faint sound of _What’s new, Pussycat?_ playing in the distance. Fantastic. Tom Jones was going to provide the background music for my death.

...No, wait, nothing. Just my imagination.

_Grease and cooked meat. Is someone grilling, or can I still smell the bar?_

"Patience, child," I muttered. "This craving's _killing_ me."

Someone at the back of the group snorted.

"RIGHT! NOW! SHUT UP!" _  
_

 "Wait, do you want him to shut up, or-?"

"YOU TOO, DAMMIT!"

Okay. I was flat. Gray rock. No fear, no impotent rage, nothing to feel superior to. Shooting me had to be as unpleasant as possible.

What options did I have? Not giving him what he wanted, obviously. Once the thrill of knowing he could make me beg for mercy wore off, he’d shoot me.

I couldn’t just charge him. That would give him a fight to win.

…Defiance? No. Crushing someone who opposes you. That would basically be the same thing as the fight.

Maybe I could try to get him to see the error of his ways. I could make a break for it while everyone was laughing too hard to breathe.

…No, wait, the response to that would probably be anger. Followed by revenge. That would also feel good.

“ _Fiiiiine_ ,” I sighed, taking a cigarette out of the pack and flicking my lighter. “I know for an absolute fact that shooting me will – fuck, godammit, hang on. Come on… fuck… _Theeere_ we go – shooting me will fuck every single one of you over. I'll win, you'll lose, and there’s no possible way you can prevent that."

Jacket glared at me and took a step forward.

“See, I’ve got this thing called exploding colon syndrome," I deadpanned, "and it’s taking a conscious effort to keep from spraying over this entire alley."

"...What."

"I'm, like... pressurized. Picture a grenade in a bucket of brown paint, and you have a pretty good idea what you’re dealing with. I’m talking complete colonic detonation, here. If you think the fact I’m facing you means you’re safe, you’re wrong. There _will_ be splashback. It’s like a wide-angle firehose full of hot cocoa. Now I am become Death, ruiner of outfits. I hope you think you look good in brown, because dude? You’re gonna be wearing it in about five seconds."

Jacket stared at me, mouth open. His hand dropped to his side, the gun pointing down at the ground.

"Yeah, I've been seeing a doctor about it, but so far-"

_NOW!_

I lunged at Jacket. He raised the gun and glowed faintly, almost imperceptibly blue. I thrust my hands out, ready to grab him, as he flew over my head mid-charge and collided with a wall.

_Stop him! He’s getting away!_

I jumped and grabbed at his foot, pulling his shoe off as he ricocheted off into the second story of the opposite building, collided with it, got smacked in the side of the head by a flying shoe, and finally soared off –

_Does the Duck Threshold apply here? Because he’s definitely passed it._

–screaming over the roof at the end of the alleyway.

More blue. Another scream. The second man sailed off and collided with a dumpster at the end of the alley. The third followed, landing on top of him. Something in the alley flickered blue-and-yellow as Chewie took off running.

“Help! Somebody!”

I thrust my foot out, noting the surprisingly pleasant scraping noise his face made as he tripped and slid along the rough ground.

 _"Naaaaaah._ There's no help here. That's why you picked an empty alley, _right?_ You can do whatever you want, and nobody can stop you."

Chewie crawled away and got to his feet.

"Oh, god, I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

"Sure you are!" I said, lunging and grabbing the back of his shirt. "You lost your gun, and your backup! I mean, shit, now someone might _actually_ _-_ "

With a loud ripping noise, his shirt gave way, leaving me with a fistful of fabric as he ran out of the alley.

_Quick! Chase him! Tackle him!  
_

Instead, I bent over, hands on my knees, and tried not to vomit onto the floor.

_…Or, you could quit smo-, start running. Build up your stamina._

_Yeah, like that’ll ever happen._

The red haze slowly receded. The tense back and roiling in my gut gave way to rubbery legs and the feeling that someone had taken a bat to most of my body. My lungs were _on fire._

I glared out at the street and took a deep breath.

_Fuck you. People aren't your toys, and you don't get to fuck with them until they break. You don't get a victim. You don't get a victim! Prick!  
_

_...You disturb me._

_The things you do disturb me. What I know about you disturbs me. The way you make me feel disturbs me._

_Everything about you disturbs me._

“you okay?”

I turned and looked at the blue-and-white blur in the alley.

“ _Huuuuunh!_ ” I replied. I held up a declaratory “wait a second” finger while I caught my breath.

“you okay?” The Sans-shaped blob repeated. I stumbled over to a blur that looked like a doorway, retrieved my glasses, and put them back on.

“ _My lungs hate me,_ ” I groaned, slumping against the wall.

“you look like you hit the back of your head, and there’s, uh… you’ve got some blood on your… lots of places.”

“Don’t worry,” I wheezed. “I’m pretty sure it isn’t mine. There’s slightly fewer holes in me than I was expecting at this point."

Sans walked over to me. He sat down on the curb, ran a hand over the back of his skull, and looked up at the sky.

“…beautiful day out.”

"Yup," I said.

Sans turned his head, watching a cloud drift by. "...i'm tired."

"...Yup," I grunted. "You and me both, dude."

We sat there in silence, just... looking up, I guess. Watching the day drift by.

I cleared my throat. "...So, that was magic? How’d you do that?”

_And how many souls would I need to pull it off? Please, tell me it's three or less!_

“do what?”

“The telekinesis gravity-gun thing."

"what?"

“…I don't know," I muttered. "Fuck it. Never mind."

Undyne thundered into the alley, shouting at the top of her lungs. “NG _AAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaa_ aaaaa _…”_

“Uh…”

She looked around the empty alley. “…What the _hell_ happened?”

“I stared death in the face, and death blinked first,” I said proudly.

Undyne turned to Sans. “Did he get punched in the face again? There’s, uh… a _lot_ of blood on his face.”

"It's not mine!" I said, grinning broadly.

“GAH!”

"gah!"

"I'm like a crime-scene investigator's wet dream!"

Undyne slowly relaxed, shifting out of her combat stance. “…How many people?”

“four," Sans said.

Undyne punched me in the arm. “Four-on-one! _Nice!”_

_Goodbye, arm. It was nice having feeling in you._

"Honestly, Sans did most of the work."

" _Wait, shit,_ " I muttered. Undyne raised an eyebrow and looked over at sans.

"yup," Sans said. "i just threw three of 'em out of this alley, 'cause i'm awesome like that."

Undyne let out a long, loud snort and doubled over with laughter.

"He was a distraction," I explained.

“…Seriously, though," she wheezed, "are you okay?”

Aside from some exhaustion, bruising, and nausea, I felt okay. Better than okay. Like... _not_ not okay. What was the word for that?

“I feel… _something_ , but I can't place my finger on it. Satisfied, I think. Dude, I feel like I just had some kind of epiphany. I can’t for the life of me say what it is, and the seething rat-king I call a brain is gnawing holes in it as we speak, but it’s still _there_.”

Sans turned towards me. “you realize you almost got shot, right?”

“Yup!”

“…you really don’t give a fuck about safety, do you?”

I stuck a cigarette in my mouth.

“You mean the safety of others, or my own?”

“…your own, i guess?”

“Because I would _disembowel_ myself to make sure other people are safe. As long as they didn’t press the issue. I’m bad at arguing with other people.”

“will, you almost got shot."

"So I did."

“Gimme a second,” I said, circling my arms. “Lemme just find someplace to set all these fucks I’m carryi– _aw, shit_.”

“Aw, man,” I said, cigarette wobbling in my mouth as I looked at the ground. “I just dropped ‘em.”

“Lordy Jesus, look at em’ all go. They’re getting away. And I was just about to give them all. Aw, geeze, there they go. Scampering off into the distance. All of the fucks. Which I was about to give. Now I have none. I am fuckless. Quick, someone catch them.”

I put my hands on my hips, watching the last of my fucks disappear over the horizon.

“Never mind. There they go. Off to Fuck Mountain, the ancestral home of all the fucks I’ve failed to give. Free to frolic under the fuck-sun, subsisting on wild fuck-berries, fucking and raising little fuck-families.”

“…I’d give any amount of money to know what it’s like inside your head,” Undyne said from behind me.

I lit the cigarette.

“It’s exhausting.”

_Aaaand there we go. Feelings are gone again. Sweet, sweet nicotine._

Undyne took another look around the alley. “Man, I was ready to kick _ass._ ”

“One of them had a gun.”

“I have a spear.”

To be fair, she did have a spear.

“…I feel like that wouldn’t have helped mu-“

The spear was embedded in the dumpster at the other end of the alley. I blinked a few times, making sure that, yes, the glowing blue spear that was just in Undyne’s hand was now stuck through the painted sheet metal several yards away.

“…That was terrifying.”

Undyne beamed at me. “Thanks!”

I surveyed the alley. _There_ was an imprint on one of the trash bags by the dumpster, where someone had landed on it. There, a faint streak where Jacket had hit the wall. There a few more glass shards from the broken streetlamp.

There was an ant.

_Hello, ant!_

Something red caught my eye. I walked over and looked down at what looked suspiciously like a patch of blood where I'd hit the ground.

“...Wait, Papyrus would probably be pretty bummed if I died, wouldn’t he?”

“probably," said Sans.

“ _Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck_ ,” I groaned.

“welcome to the club.”

“What?” Undyne asked.

“…nothing," Sans said. "never mind.”

I coughed and turned to Sans. “Speaking of which, where’s–?“

_Whap whap whap whap whap WHAP…_

“PHIL!”

“Papyrus! Papyrus, it's okay. Everything's fine, the situation's been dealt with, nobody got hurt. Are you okay?"

“ARE YOU OKAY?”

“...Technically, yeah. "

Papyrus held up a hand. “HOW MANY FINGERS AM I HOLD-?“

“Four. Four fingers. How do my pupils look?”

Papyrus leaned in and rubbed his chin, squinting at me.

“...ROUND.”

“Okay. If I pass out or start acting like an even bigger dick than I was before, call an ambulance. In the meantime, I’m gonna go drink until there’s a change in my condition. Come on, I'll buy you one too."

“WHAT HAPPENED?!”

“I think I almost got shot, but I’m not one-hundred percent sure. Can we go back to the bar? I’ve always been pretty sure Hell looks exactly the same as my normal life except there’s no alcohol, so I should probably go check that."

“OKAY, BUT WHAT HAPPENED?”

“I'm _honestly_ not quite sure, but I know that liquor helps. Trust me, that shit's like mental duct tape.”

I clapped my hands together. “So, drinks! I’m buying; let’s go!”

“CAN WE TALK ABOUT WHAT HAPPENED, FIRST?”

“Can we do it at the bar?"

“I’D LIKE TO TALK NOW.”

“Okay,” I said, holding up a finger, “we could, but consider this: alcohol.”

“PHIL…”

“Ethanol. Booze. _Social lubrication._ ”

“PHIL, I COU–“

“Fun-juice. Happiness elixir. Good-times tonic. Bottled bliss. Liquid joy. Feel-good potion! Let’s go get some!"

Papyrus and Undyne shared a meaningful look. She shrugged.

“…PHIL," Papyrus said, "I COULD HAVE TALKED MY WAY OUT OF THAT."

“... _Seriously?_ "

“THIS IS A BRIGHTLY-LIT, PUBLIC PLACE, SO... YES."

" _No,_ Papyrus," said Undyne.

"You don’t _know_ that,” I said, backing towards the bar. “I'd say the fact that they’re pointing a gun at you means they think they can get away with pretty much anything, and if they shoot you, you won’t be able to identify their faces.”

"Trust me, anything that happened was going to escalate the situation. The only thing I could do was escalate it in a technically sort-of safe-ish direction.”

“HOW DID YOU KNOW THEY WOULDN’T SHOOT _YOU?_ ” Papyrus demanded.

I stopped.

“…I didn’t,” I admitted.

"Now, if you don’t mind, I’ve gotta go pay my tab.” I reached inside my pocket, making sure Jacket's wallet was still there, then turned and strode away.

“And wash this blood off my coat!” I called back. “I don’t need it anymore!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no idea what I'm doing here.


End file.
